by Dave Duncan
“Oh, yes, ma’am, and thank you, ma’am, it won’t ever—”
“Now tell our son to come here at once. If he won’t wake up, warn him I will send the porters with buckets of well water.”
Greatly relieved that nothing terrible was going to happen to her soon, Tiatia scrambled up and fled.
Our son. Irona did not look at Veer. She knew how much he disliked being classed as Podakan’s father. He admitted to hating Podakan, and there were times when she almost did so herself. This was one of them. Vly’s child would have broken his heart.
“How can you prevent it happening again?” Veer asked. “If she won’t consent, he’ll rape her.”
“As far as I’m concerned he already has. And he won’t, because he isn’t going to be here.”
Veer guessed at once what she had in mind. “Is that wise?”
“He’s going to be the Empire’s secret weapon.” Irona wasn’t sure how much she was joking.
Without a knock, the door flew open and in walked the problem, with one hand behind his back. Newly turned fifteen, Podakan Lavice was already taller than most grown men, although not quite a match for Veer yet. His oversized hands and feet suggested that he still had more growing to do, quite apart from filling out his adolescent lankness with bulk. He took after his grandfather, Akanagure Matrinko, having inherited much of his brutishness as well as his size. He was barefoot, clad only in yesterday’s stained smock, and his hair looked like kelp on a rock. Long hair was the style now, so his had to be longer than anyone’s. His eyes were scarlet and his head must be pounding, but he made an effort to look cheerful.
“Greetings, Dam. And you, Machin. Lovely morning.”
Irona pointed at the floor in front of her.
He shrugged, walked over, and knelt. Then he produced the bucket he had brought and set it between them. At least it hadn’t been used yet.
“Just in case,” he said. “Where do you get that awful wine, Machin?”
“Last night you abused one of my slaves,” Irona said.
“Not abused, Dam. She loves it.”
“So that she can bear a freeborn child, which you will have to raise?”
He shrugged, but the smile had gone. “We’re still only kids. No problem yet.”
“Do you believe that or is it just what you tell her?”
He shrugged again. As long as the girl believed it, he could get what he wanted, so what else mattered?
“You remember our agreement?”
“Agreement, my ass. You’re going to sell your fifteen-year-old son into slavery for humping one of your slave girls?”
He was right, of course. No judge would agree.
“Oh, Podakan, we haven’t had to paint the slave mark on your shoulder for months. I was really hoping that you had started to behave like an adult.”
“That’s exactly what I was doing last night. It’s fun!” He glanced at Veer as he said that. He didn’t need to mention that Veer had failed to father any children with Irona in more than a dozen years.
“Silence! She is my slave and I will decide who sleeps with her, if anyone. I am going to have you stripped and tied up in the courtyard, and have Tidore give you five strokes of a rod on your buttocks, with the entire household watching. I’m sure he won’t hold back.”
Podakan didn’t speak, but his irises slid up until white showed under them, so he looked blind. She knew it as a sign of suppressed rage and thought of it as his killer look. Given the chance, he would now go away to smash something or hurt someone.
“Irona,” Veer said, “I think you’d better leave his tunic on. He’s one of those twisted people who enjoy pain. You exhibit him naked and he’s likely to display an erection, just to embarrass you.”
“Blabbermouth!” Podakan said. “I was saving that as a treat for her, fat man.”
“Thanks, Veer,” Irona said. “Earlier yesterday, Podakan, where were you?”
He blinked a few times until his eyes returned to normal. “It was Festival, remember? Down in the Old City, celebrating with the guys. Who got chosen?”
“Some boy from the Old Town.”
His mouth opened and then closed. He knew she was lying.
“Come to think of it,” Irona said, “it was a girl, Apolima. Seems promising, I hear. Kao Bukit was there, of course. And his father.”
Silence.
“Daun saw you, Podakan.”
“Didn’t see him. Saw Kao, though. He was a little slug five years ago. He’s still a slug and not much bigger.”
“Podakan, I have told you before that you are not eligible to go to the choosing, because you were not born in Benign. A year from now, I will—”
“—will certify to the priests that you’re a citizen and I’m your little boy. Then I swear to obey the laws and it’s done. I’ll be a citizen, but I can’t be a Chosen. I think I’ve got it now, Dam.”
“But you went to the choosing anyway, when you’re only fifteen. That is sacrilege! Do you know what would have—”
“Didn’t!” the boy snapped. “Didn’t try to go in that side. Liado’s dad’s off on the mainland; he’d no one to take him, so I said I’d go with him and pretend to be his uncle.”
“No! Oh, Podakan, that’s as bad, almost.”
He smirked. “Didn’t have to. The priests didn’t even ask.”
It was plausible. He certainly looked like an adult, if a baby-faced one, and there was no rule against a friend or older brother escorting a pilgrim.
“So you didn’t break the law. That is good, Podakan Lavice, because do you know what I was planning to do? I was planning another ten strokes of that rod. That is absolutely nothing compared to what the court would give you, and brand you as well. So you escape that, but you still get the five. And you and I still have to get through one more year before I stop being legally responsible for your actions. Do you want to get me flogged?”
“You mean usually or just right now?”
“I’ll add one more stroke for insolence. And we’d best get it over with now, because we’ll be leaving in a few days.”
“Going where?” he growled suspiciously.
“To Achelone. There’s a war on, and I expect to be appointed admiral.”
His face lit up, and he flexed the muscles in his arms. “Can I row this time?”
Two frantic days later, Irona embarked on her flagship, Foam Racer. For commodore she had recruited her old associate, Mandalagan Furnas. This was to be no token force of a couple of hundred marines. The Seventy had insisted on mobilizing the entire Empire against the Gren, although Irona had argued that there was no way Achelone could feed an army of tens of thousands. Her advice had been ignored in a panic of war fever. Now her only hope was to get there first and organize some sort of a reception for everyone else. If Caprice favored her, she might manage to defeat the invaders before the allies’ forces arrived, so she could send them straight home again. The worm in the apple was that nobody had yet discovered how to kill Gren.
With her was Daun Bukit, still her trusted chief of staff. Sazen Hostin was traveling on another galley, but he would join her when they reached the front, and then it would be quite like old times. She had made sure there was room on Foam Racer for Podakan, who was a much bigger handful than he had been on her last trip to Achelone. She could count the days until she would wash her hands of him, although Caprice alone knew what would happen to him then.
He had gone on ahead, either childishly eager to watch the preparations or unwilling to trust his badly bruised buttocks in a sedan chair. She had given him a pass to enter the naval docks and found him down there, gaping around in glee at the bustle of marines and porters, chandlers and carpenters, and dozens more. Momentarily, he was a kid again.
But the first thing he said was, “I wanna row!”
As tactfully as she could,
Irona said, “Rowers sit on sealskin cushions, dear. They slide back and forth with every stroke. I doubt if your backside is in good enough shape to do that all day.”
“Pain never stops me, you know that. It’s a test of manhood. I bought an oarsman’s cushion. I wanna row!”
“I’m proud of your courage, but if you lose the stroke and tangle the others, you may injure other men as well as yourself.” Seeing his stubborn look, she added. “Ask Commodore Furnas if you want. Just don’t say I order it!” She foresaw no problem, because she had warned Furnas the previous day.
By the time she boarded, though, Podakan was proudly sitting on a rower’s bench, surrounded by grown men no taller than he and parrying their lewd banter like a veteran. Somehow he had acquired the correct attire of leather shorts. Apart from a lack of hair on chin or chest, he didn’t look at all out of place, and she felt an absurd knot of pride in her throat, as if she had created him the way Veer created a portrait. At times Podakan seemed to go from five years old to twenty-five and back again between breaths.
Commodore Furnas had trouble meeting Irona’s eye. “You didn’t tell me he’d be one of the biggest men aboard, ma’am.”
“He’s a child, Commodore. He can’t row all day!”
“I’ve doubled him up with Sturge, there. He’s a good hand, ma’am. He’ll keep his arms folded until he sees trouble coming, then take over the oar. You ought to be proud of yon lad! Grown a lot since the last time we went to Achelone.”
In some ways he had. He still had to learn that other people mattered.
She was more open with Daun as they stood on the steersman’s deck waiting for something to happen. Foam Racer was at anchor. Furnas was being rowed around her, checking the trim. The hands were shifting stores as the bosun bellowed orders. No one was listening to the passengers.
“He didn’t try to pass himself off as sixteen at the temple,” she said. “He was waved in through the adult gate.”
Daun said nothing, just stared at the man in question, heaving bales and barrels around with the crew, playing at being one of them. Marines had to accept discipline, and Irona could not imagine Pod ever doing that.
“You saw?” she asked.
“Didn’t see that, ma’am.”
Oh, Goddess! So Pod had not merely walked through the adult side, he had passed himself off as Benign born, lying about this age, pretended to be one of the pilgrims. She did not wonder which one was lying. She had trusted Daun since before Podakan was born.
“Did Kao see him there?”
“He hasn’t mentioned it. I didn’t ask.”
“Thank you,” she said. “I should know better by now than to take his word on anything.” If Kao had seen, then the worm could bite back now; the childhood victim could report his former tormentor for perjury and sacrilege and watch Podakan go to the sea death, and Irona with him, likely. “I don’t know where I went wrong with Podakan. I suppose I neglected my son to serve the goddess. His grandmother tried to fill the gap, but she died when he was still small, and the women I hired kept leaving. He drove them away.”
“The damage probably happened before all that, ma’am.”
“Meaning?”
“He was born at Vult.”
“I can’t blame Vult for all of it.”
“That place destroyed some men faster than others.” Daun pulled a face at the memories. “The worst of them just disappeared. I had a couple of friends who … withered. It didn’t change you at all, ma’am, not so far as I could see.”
“Nor you. That was the first thing I noticed about you, that you didn’t have the dead look your companions did.”
“I was determined to survive and come back to Kanaga. I think her love saved me.”
“And I had my duty, and my child.” Vly had succumbed faster than anyone, because Irona would not have had to endure the ordeal of Vulk had he not asked her for a child. His sense of guilt had driven him crazy.
“It was better after I got the trogs out,” she said.
“It was better,” Daun agreed.
But that had been too late to save Vly. Was a child of rape contaminated from conception? That seemed like a sleazy excuse for bad parenting.
“How long do you imagine he’ll last rowing?”
“Until he’s told to stop,” Daun said confidently.
“But he hasn’t got an oar puller’s hands.” She was more worried by the pain of the bruises she mustn’t mention. That beating had been a terrible mistake, of course. Podakan had taken his punishment without a murmur—with his smock on—and had then had the nerve to tell her the sex had been worth it.
“But he won’t stop. All respect, ma’am, he gets that from you. You never admit defeat, nor will he. Once, after he hurt Kao real bad, I took my belt to him. I knew I shouldn’t, but I just couldn’t stand it any longer. I hit him as often as I dared. He was only about five, but he didn’t make a sound. Did he tell you about that?”
“No. I suppose he took it out on Kao later?”
Daun nodded glumly.
The commodore was coming aboard again. The bosun was ordering the men back to their benches.
“I may lie about his age myself,” Irona said. “I’m not going to rest easy until he’s been sworn in as a marine. Maybe the Republic can tame him better than I ever have.”
The flagship upped anchor eventually. Oars dipped and swayed, oarlocks creaked. Irona watched Podakan work and sweat. His minder, Sturge, sat beside him, waiting to take over when he gave up, and no doubt expecting that to be soon. But Daun had predicted he would never stop, and Daun knew Pod well. Not for the first time, Irona wondered whether her son did not feel pain as other people did, or felt it and enjoyed it, as Veer believed. No other form of discipline worked any better on him.
One by one the other galleys followed in line—ten of them in all, almost two thousand men going to war. Her vice admiral, Dilivost 678, would bring up the rear. Dilivost was more than twenty years her senior and had more experience of action, although even he had not seen much real fighting, for the Empire had long been at peace. Age had not reduced his pomposity or increased his chin, but when his name was mentioned for the command, he had shown enough sense to refuse, claiming that he was too old. Unfortunately, he had not refused to serve as her deputy. He would not have been her choice. Dilivost was competent and hardworking, but seriously lacking in imagination—a good adjutant but a poor chief. If anything happened to Irona, anything might happen under Dilivost.
The bay was full of sailboats as people came to watch the fleet depart. Benign had not sent out such a force of its own troops in thirty years, and never under a woman’s command. Others would join them before they reached Achelone: tribute forces, perhaps fifteen thousand in all. The Empire was going off to war again.
Execution Bridge on one hand, Brackish on the other, and ahead the long swell of the sea. Foam Racer was leaving the bay. Predictably, Commodore Furnas was standing close, watching the other ships line up before he formally asked for orders.
Irona smiled teasingly. “What does the wine shop scuttlebutt say about our objective?”
“Says we’re going south, Y’r Honor, going after the Three Kingdoms. Teach them a lesson, pick up some loot and slaves.”
If only it were that simple! Any marine who turned a slave over to the dealers in good condition was instantly rich. But who would want to buy a Gren?
“I’m happy to hear that for once they’ve got it wrong. Set course for Achelone, if you please, Commodore.”
“Aye, aye, ma’am.” He need do nothing more than hold his easterly course and let the rest of the ships follow. In an hour or so, he would veer to the northeast. But he glanced back at the great fleet still emerging from the bay and pursed his lips.
“Yes,” Irona said, speaking softly so that the coxswain and steersman would not hear. “It’s more th
an Gren raiding this time. It’s a full-fledged invasion. The latest news was that Sakar Semeru was hung up by his heels and skinned alive. And that was before the enemy even got there.”
“Ah!” said Mandalagan Furnas. “They do say there’s a pearl in every oyster if you look long enough. Overnight at Shellong, ma’am?”
“I leave that to your judgment. I’ll address the troops when we beach.”
The galley was starting to pitch in the swell, which made the rowing harder. Sturge took a grip of the oar and said something to Podakan, who nodded impatiently. After a few strokes, he got the knack and Sturge left him on his own again.
At the first watering break, the commodore inspected his volunteer help and allowed him to continue. At the second rest, he took one look at Podakan’s bloody hands and ordered him aft. The boy obeyed as meekly as any veteran marine, as he never did for his mother. She noticed that the rest of the crew didn’t jeer him for quitting. They didn’t cheer him either, but their silence sounded like respect.
Shellong was a rock barely worth the name of island, about a third of the way to the mainland, a convenient place for a ship to make its first landfall and scratch its first-day itches: find misplaced gear, grease squeaky oarlocks, caulk minor leaks, rearrange shifting cargo. Shellong lacked water or arable land, but it had a long shingle beach on the leeward side. There the fleet pulled up for the night to pitch camp. And there Irona made a speech.
She had done this many times now, and her initial terror had long since been overcome and forgotten. She stood on a rock with her back to the breeze, well away from the noisy waves. Her captains stood close around her with their bosuns behind them, looking over their shoulders. The rest of the two thousand jammed in tight, older men in front, youngsters with sharper ears on the outskirts.
“We sail for the Bight and the Huequi River. I hear your moans! But it is Midsummer and the current should not be too strong. And before the river is Sodore. Some of you were there with me before. Good food, I know, and good beer, and from the stories I heard of the girls, they were even better.”
She waited for the cheering to end. “Achelone is an ally of Benign. They are friends of Benign, part of the Empire. One of us. We have never been at war with Achelone. It asked to join the Empire almost a hundred years ago and the Seventy voted to admit it.”