The Destined Queen

by Deborah Hale

  Suddenly a light appeared ahead of them and the passage opened into a room. Rath lurched forward, stumbling on something. An instant later, a raised doorsill caught Maura’s foot and made her stumble, too. As she squinted against the light, she felt Rath’s hand wrenched out of hers.

  Before she could open her other hand to release a cloud of powered madfern into the air, Rath cried, “No!”

  “In case you haven’t noticed, inlander,” their tattooed guide chuckled. “You aren’t in any position to be giving orders.”

  Maura knew Rath had been speaking to her—not that it mattered. For at the same instant, someone grabbed her hands and pulled them tight behind her back. She concentrated on keeping her fist clenched around the powdered madfern until she got a better opportunity to use it.

  “Well, well, what have we here?” asked a voice.

  Maura glanced up at the speaker as he rose from a chair and turned to look them over. He was a small, slender man, a bit less than her own height, which was tall for a woman. The man wore black breeches and leather boots that reached halfway up his thighs. His shirt, the color of dark blood, billowed in loose folds over his arms and upper body, while a long strip of the same cloth had been wound around his head. It covered all his hair except for a long, black plume that stuck out of an opening in the top—a mockery of the way Hanish soldiers pulled their pale hair through the tops of their helmets.

  For a moment Maura thought he had a fur collar draped around his shoulders. Then the “collar” raised its head, stared at her and hissed. She flinched from the creature, a longlegged hillcat with sleek brown fur.

  “Mind your manners, Abri.” The man raised his hand to caress the beast.

  He wore snug-fitted leather gloves with holes through which his bare thumb and fingers poked. Only three fingers, though. The smallest on each hand was missing.

  “This inlander strolled into the Monkey,” said the tattooed man, “with a wench twice too pretty for the likes of him. Said he wanted to see Captain Gull.”

  “Indeed?” The little man sauntered toward Maura.

  When he lifted his hand, she flinched, but he only tilted her chin with the gentle pressure of his fingers to turn her head to one side.

  “Tell me, inlander, was that all you wanted—to see me?” He let go of Maura, stepped back and struck a pose. “Now you have seen me.”

  He glanced toward the tattooed man, and in as mannerly a voice as he might have used to bid them be escorted away, he ordered, “Kill them.”

  “We wanted more than to see you!” Rath cast Maura a sidelong glance that she sensed meant, “Get ready!”

  She flashed him one back that she hoped he would understand meant, “This is not going to work.”

  Oh, she could mutter the spell under her breath and drop the madfern. Perhaps even kick it up into the air. But in this small, crowded room, there was a good chance she and Rath would become as befuddled as everyone else. Or the others might do them some harm while in the grip of their confusion.

  “We were told you could take us to the Vestan Islands,” said Rath. “Can you? Will you? It is vital we reach there!”

  Captain Gull looked from Rath to Maura and back again. All the while he petted the cat draped around his neck. “You must know it is death for any Umbrian to sail more than five miles from the mainland. My friends and I are but humble fisherfolk.”

  Maura could not bite back a retort. “You do not look like any fisherman I ever heard of!”

  “Ha!” Captain Gull let out a laugh that seemed far too deep and loud for his slender frame.

  “A bold wench!” He remarked to the cat. “I like that.”

  The cat looked over at Maura and hissed again.

  “Mmm, I reckon you’re right, Abri.” Gull shook his head, a look of deep regret shadowing his fine features. “These two must be Hanish spies.”

  He glanced toward the large tattooed man and amended his previous order. “Kill them slow.”

  3

  A s Rath listened to Captain Gull order their deaths in such an offhand tone, he sensed the strange little man was more truly dangerous than the outlaw Vang Spear of Heaven, with all his bluster.

  He should never have brought Maura here, Rath chided himself. He should have left her somewhere safe while he’d come in search of the smuggler. In truth, the notion had crossed his mind, but he’d worried what harm she might come to if he was not there to protect her. Instead, he’d hauled her into danger from which he would be hard-pressed to protect her.

  If she could give him the slightest edge by casting her spell, he would try to fight their way out of here…though he didn’t fancy his chances.

  “Kill us if you must and if you can!” He hurled the challenge at Captain Gull. “But do not let it be because you believe us Hanish spies!”

  Though it made him feel unbearably vulnerable, he bent forward, baring the back of his neck for them to see. The flesh still felt tender where the Han had branded him, almost a fortnight ago.

  Rath heard Maura suck in her breath through clenched teeth. He had not told her about the brand, though he knew she could have compounded a salve to soothe and heal it. Once or twice, when she’d thrown her arms around his neck too eagerly, he’d had to bite back a grunt of pain.

  “Well!” Captain Gull sounded shaken out of his amused indifference. “I have never seen one of those marks on a living man, inlander. How did you come by it?”

  “The usual way.” Rath straightened up and shot a look around at Gull and his men. “It is the first thing they do to you when you’re sent into the mines…after a whiff of slag to dull the pain and sap the fight out of you.”

  “How do you come to be here, then?” Gull’s dark eyes narrowed. “No man has ever escaped the mines…unless he made a bargain to spy for the Han in exchange for his freedom.”

  “You disappoint me, Gull.” Rath hoped the insult would not cost him his head.

  “Do I?” Gull sounded intrigued rather than enraged. “How so?”

  “I took you for a man who makes it his business to know what’s what in the world. There have been escapes from the mines, though not many and not much talked of. The Han try to keep word from spreading, in case it should inspire more miners to try. And the men who escape are not eager to call attention to themselves by bragging.”

  The hillcat rubbed its head against Gull’s cheek. He reached up to pet it, but his gaze never left Rath’s. “Do not flatter yourself that I let you see all I may or may not know.”

  Perhaps the time had come for Rath to try a little flattery. “It does not take a clever man to guess that the first must far outweigh the last, Captain.”

  Gull chuckled. “Believe it, inlander. A man like me does not survive in this town unless he is well armed with the right knowledge.”

  “Then you must have heard rumors of a revolt at the Beastmount Mine. A successful revolt.”

  “Amazing if it is true.”

  “It is true.” Rath could not keep a ring of triumph from his voice. “And it was amazing.”

  Feeling the hold on his arms loosen, he tugged them free, but made no rash move to draw his weapons. “I led those men and now the lass and I have been summoned to the Vestan Islands. If you cannot take us, let us go so we may seek passage elsewhere.”

  Gull took some time to reach his decision…or to announce it, at least. While everyone stood waiting, he sauntered around the room, petting the cat and feeding it small scraps of what looked like raw fish from a heaping platter on the table.

  At last, when Rath had prepared himself for another casual death order, Gull looked up at him and Maura as if wondering what they were still doing there. “Lucky for you the summer Ore Fleet has already sailed with its cargo of metal back to Dun Derhan. Otherwise nothing could persuade me to venture those waters.”

  He directed his next words at the tattooed fellow standing behind Rath. “Don’t just stand there, Nax, find our guests food and a place to sleep.”

 
“You will accept my hospitality, I hope?” he asked Rath and Maura. “We will need to be on our way very early tomorrow.”

  Before Rath could reply, Maura spoke up, “You honor us with your kindness, Captain. May the Giver’s favor fall upon you.”

  Gull accepted her blessing with a wry smirk and an exaggerated bow.

  Rath guessed the man did not risk his life keeping open tenuous links between the Umbrian mainland and the Islands out of duty to the Giver. Likewise, his offer of food and shelter was an act of caution, not kindness. If they were spies, Gull would not give them a chance to steal away and tell the local garrison about the forbidden voyage he had agreed to make.

  Rath suspected Maura knew it, too. But since they had no money and knew no one in Duskport, even a smuggler’s hospitality beat sleeping out in the fog. Perhaps destiny was taking care of them, after all.

  The man called Nax led them through a maze of narrow hallways and up two flights of stairs to a snug, windowless room. The latter did not sit well with Rath, who preferred open spaces and always liked to have an avenue of escape. But he hid his misgivings from Maura, who seemed pleased enough with Captain Gull’s “hospitality.”

  “Luxury!” She threw herself down onto the thick straw mattress in one corner of the room. She sniffed. “The straw’s clean, too, strewn with honeygrass and pestweed.”

  Rath forced a smile and nodded. The most comfortable cage in the world was still a cage.

  “There’s plenty of room for us both.” She patted the mattress.

  “A good thing,” he teased. “I would feel bad making you sleep on bare floor.”

  The door opened and Nax entered bearing a well-laden tray. “I hope you’re hungry. There’s plenty here.”

  Maura scrambled up from the mattress. “This looks like a feast for twice our number! Give Captain Gull our thanks for his generosity.”

  “Very good, mistress.” The large, menacing smuggler sounded so meek, Rath could scarcely keep from chuckling. “If there’s anything more you need—anything at all—just give a call.”

  That cordial invitation did not reassure Rath. It only confirmed his certainty that one of Gull’s men would be standing guard outside the door. He hoped the cozy straw mattress would not put any amorous notions in Maura’s head. Much as he wanted her, he could not abide the thought of someone listening in on them, perhaps thinking about her that way.

  Nax set the tray down on a low table in the opposite corner of the room from the mattress. Once he had gone, Maura pounced on the food.

  “Hold a moment!” Rath grabbed her hand on its way to her mouth bearing a biscuit of some kind. “How do you know that’s not poisoned?”

  “Don’t be daft.” Maura jerked her hand free and took a bite before he could stop her. “If Captain Gull decided to have us killed, he had no need to go to all this bother. He could just have let his first order stand.”

  “Or his second,” Rath muttered. How could she talk about threats of cold murder as if they were trifles?

  “Just so.” Maura swallowed her first bite and took another. “It would make no sense for him to pretend he was going to take us to the Vestan Islands, then waste perfectly good food by using it to poison us.”

  She stared at her left hand, which was still clenched in a tight fist. “I had better wash off this madfern, though, or I could do myself worse harm than our host means us.”

  Her tone reminded Rath of the gentle scoldings he used to get from Ganny when he was a young fellow. Maura was probably right. Somehow, when it came to her safety, caution got the better of his good sense.

  He picked up a fried patty of some kind and gave it a suspicious sniff. “Smells all right, I reckon.”

  Maura shook her head and chuckled as she washed her hands in a small basin beside the bed. “I’m certain this food is no more poisoned than the barleymush I fed you the night I brought you to Langbard’s cottage.”

  How foolish it seemed, looking back, for him to have suspected her and her kindly wizard guardian of treachery.

  “That was different,” Rath growled, taking a nibble of the patty, which turned out to be a toothsome mixture of fish and vegetables. “I had no good reason to mistrust you, except that the Han had made me suspicious of all magic users. Placing your trust in a fellow like Gull is a quick way to get yourself killed. You mark me.”

  He’d only meant to take the one tiny bite, then wait to see if it made him ill. Now Rath looked down at his hand to find he’d wolfed the whole patty.

  “I mark you very well.” Maura stole up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to his back. “I did not trust you, in the beginning, any more than you trusted me, remember? I was certain you would murder Langbard and me in our sleep on the road to Prum. As it turned out, I could not have been more wrong. So if I have become less wary of dangerous-looking men, you have only yourself to blame.”

  Bad enough she was right. Did she have to remind him he was the rogue who’d taught her this dangerous lack of caution?

  He echoed what he had said to her after she’d tricked him into eating that barleymush. “Oh well, if the food is poisoned and the room a trap, we are done for anyway. Might as well die with a full belly and a decent sleep.”

  “Anything else?” asked Maura, sliding one hand up under his vest.

  Rath glanced toward the mattress in the corner. Perhaps if they were very, very quiet…?

  A loud banging jolted Maura from the warm haven of sleep in Rath’s arms to the baffling fright of impenetrable darkness and hard limbs thrashing around her.

  Then a blessed sliver of light appeared and a deep, hoarse voice called, “Time to rise! Sea-going folk cannot afford to loll in bed till all hours, like inlanders.”

  Rath’s thrashing stilled. He must have remembered where they were, as Maura had.

  Someone—Nax by the sound of his voice—thrust a lit candle into the room and set it down on the table.

  “Take these—” he tossed a soft, bulky bundle onto the mattress “—and make ready to go as quick as you can.”

  Despite the need for haste, Rath gathered Maura into a swift embrace. “I didn’t do you any harm just now, did I?”

  When she assured him she had only been frightened by their abrupt waking in the darkness, Rath cursed. “I hate not knowing where I am when I waken. It does not happen to me often, but when it does, it gives me a wicked fright and makes me lash out at whoever is nearest at hand.”

  He pressed a kiss on her brow, “I entreat your pardon.”

  “It is yours, now and ever.” She clung to him an instant longer then turned to peel open the bundle.

  “A change of clothes for us, I reckon.” Rath grabbed a shirt that appeared to be his size and pulled it on. “So we do not look quite so much like inlanders.”

  Maura picked up the smaller of two pair of breeches. “And I do not look so much like a woman. How do you put these on?”

  With Rath’s help, she dressed in boy’s garments then hid her braided hair beneath a cloth cap. Not knowing if they would be given any breakfast, they ate some of the food left over from the previous night.

  “At least now we can be certain it is not poisoned,” Maura teased Rath as he gobbled up several cold fish patties.

  He replied with a menacing growl that only made Maura laugh. Then he lifted the candle and looked her over with a critical stare. “If we meet up with anyone who might cause trouble, keep behind me. You won’t fool anybody who looks too close.”

  He began to gather their clothes into a bundle, when another knock sounded on the door and Nax pushed it open without waiting for an invitation. “You ready?”

  “Aye.” Rath tucked their bundle of clothes under his arm and bid Maura bring the candle.

  “Hold on, now.” Nax pointed toward Rath’s scabbard. “You’ll have to leave that behind, and the clothes, too.”

  As the first sounds of protest left Rath’s mouth, the man nodded toward Maura’s sash. “And tha
t. Off with ’em.”

  “Damned if I will go unarmed!” cried Rath.

  Maura dug a pinch of spider silk from its pouch. She had been stripped of her sash once by an enemy, and she had no wish to be rendered so vulnerable again.

  “Captain Gull don’t care whether you’re armed,” said Nax, “so long as the weapon’s not metal or you will damn us all!”

  The way the two men glared at each other, Maura feared they would soon trade blows unless someone stopped them. Fighting her ingrained instinct to flee or hide from conflict, she pushed herself into the middle of their quarrel.

  “Metal will damn you all? What does that mean? My companion’s blades have been tempered of mortcraft, I promise you.”

  “Your pardon, mistress.” Nax shook his head. “But tempered is not good enough.” He glared at Rath over Maura’s shoulder.

  “Not good enough for what?” she persisted. “Forgive our ignorance—we are inlanders, as you know.”

  He should know, for he had reminded them of it often enough in a tone that proclaimed his contempt. Did all coast folk in Umbria look down on inlanders? Maura wondered. The way people from the Hitherland accounted all Dusk Coasters smugglers and pirates? And folk in Norest poked fun at Tarshites for their rustic speech and manners? Before Umbrians could hope to throw off the yoke of the Han, they would need to forget such prejudices and come together.

  “You do not know?” A look of doubt softened Nax’s fierce countenance. Had he thought Rath opposed his order out of arrogance or stubbornness?

  Maura shook her head.

  “It’s the Islands, see?” Nax explained. “Do you not know why the Han haven’t overrun them along with the rest of the kingdom?”

  “I have heard the waters are treacherous,” said Maura, “and the Han are not the best of sailors.”

  “The Islands have nothing the Han want,” snapped Rath. “If they were riddled with metal and gems like the Blood Moon Mountains, they would have fallen to the Han long ago.”

  Maura stabbed backward with her elbow and made forceful contact with some part of Rath. She loved the man to the depths of her heart, but that did not mean he had lost his power to try her patience.