But even in that she fought them, refusing to walk, throwing herself about, striking them with her fists, hoping they’d find her too much of a hindrance and let her go. Instead someone cuffed her alongside the head—
When she came to, her head hurt and she was jolting like a sack of wheat over a man’s shoulder as he carried her hurriedly down a dark corridor. Her hands were bound at the wrists behind her back, and his shoulder dug painfully into her stomach, pressing up against her lungs so that she could barely breathe. Smoke tainted the air.
The grotto that held the dock area was filled with smoke and shouting. It was difficult to see anything draped as she was with her face to her carrier’s back, but glimpses as he moved about showed her that one of the galleys had swung around broadside to become lodged between the walls of the tunnel to the open sea. Helpless to prevent boarding from the enemy outside, it had been set afire, effectively trapping the rest of the nineteen vessels moored here. In the shifting smoke she saw men fighting with swords and clubs on its deck, and in some cases, grappling hand to hand.
At Uumbra’s command her party turned and headed back into the fortress. Another dark, stomach-jolting journey ensued, during which she reacquired enough of her senses to think again and to realize three things: that Abramm must’ve used the galleys Katahn had brought him to invade this place and prevent the deployment of the enemy’s forces; that Uumbra could not be allowed to use her against him, even if she had to throw herself overboard; and that her wrists were bound with a leather thong that she might be able to sever with the Light, a skill she’d heard of others possessing—some said Trap Meridon could do it—but that she herself had never tried.
If she succeeded, the flare would probably startle the man carrying her enough she might elude him. She’d just have to pick her time and place carefully.
Before long they entered a second, much brighter, grotto. The water at the entrance tunnel glowed an intense blue, and the air was much less smoky. As they hurried along the docks, she glimpsed the galleys here moving out through the exit, prow to stern in a close line, oars sweeping in dark silhouette against the bright water. Realizing this could be her last chance for escape, she focused on the leather encircling her wrists and on the Light in her flesh. Her efforts were rewarded by a brief white flash, followed by the man’s sudden cry as he flailed back and she fell off his shoulder, her hands coming free not quite quickly enough to shield her from the fall. She landed hard on one shoulder, the breath jolted out of her. Even so, she hurled herself off the dock’s edge, stars sparkling across her vision.
The water was shockingly cold, but she ignored it, staying under the surface as she turned and swam under the dock, heading for the deep shadows at its back, and surprised by what a heavy hindrance her skirts suddenly became. Thankfully, she found a piling to cling to and pulled herself up until her head broke through the surface and she could breathe again. By then one of the men had jumped into the water behind her, but he seemed hesitant to let go of the dockside to come after her. Esurhites, she’d heard, were not big swimmers, despite their infamous navy. She watched him treading water at the place where the light melded into shadow as she pulled herself around behind the piling and lifted her dress up around her, willing herself invisible.
He swam back and forth a few times, and then, as she had hoped, time must’ve run out, for he pulled himself out of the water and she heard thumping on the planks above her.
No sooner had the sound faded than she cursed herself for forgetting about the orb. They still had it. . . .
Frantically she dragged herself back to the light, her skirts more of a weight now than ever. As she pulled herself back onto the dock she saw Uumbra out along one of the slips, already hurrying over the gangplank onto the last galley still moored. He glanced over his shoulder toward the landing where they’d first entered, then shouted at the two men who were still hobbling along the dock with the prodigiously heavy guardstar. At his words, they staggered toward the dock’s edge and, to her horror, let their burden go. The whole of it, guardstar and canvas both, plummeted rapidly into the dark depths of the sea and out of sight. As they hurried up the gangplank, the galley was already moving away.
She sagged onto the wet planks, drenched, shivering, and wondering if there’d be any way to get it back. This grotto might not be as deep as open sea and—
She was seized from behind, lifted off her feet and flipped onto someone’s shoulder. Struggling and flailing, she soon discovered the man’s bald head and knew it was Xemai again, running now along an aisle on the dock, though she had no idea where he was headed. Darkness swallowed them, and the strong odor of axle grease and wet rope suggested they’d entered a storage chamber. A few steps in he stopped and slid her off his shoulder. As soon as her feet touched ground, she swung away from him, but he was ready for that and went with the movement, so that instead of escaping she was slammed hard into a stone wall. Her ears rang and she barely held on to consciousness as he picked her up by the waist and dragged her deeper into the chamber, where he flung her onto the floor and stood over her, fumbling with the fastening on his britches. He may get you back, voices suddenly whispered in her ears, but you’ll be damaged goods. . . .
Desperate, she scrambled away from him, but he Commanded her to stop, and this time the fear the whispered words had generated gave the order the power to take hold. She stared at the ceiling, stunned, thinking this couldn’t be happening to her as he dropped to his knees, straddling her, and shoved her sodden skirts up out of the way.
Father Eidon . . .
Barely had she formed the plea when he was yanked off of her. She saw a tall dark form, the flash of a sword, the zing of white as the Light flowed into it, and then only the shadows, lit by the dim torchlight flickering through the opening behind her rescuer.
He was tall, swarthy-faced, and cloaked in black. His hair was dark but short, and the rapier that gleamed in his gloved hand was clearly of Kiriathan make. A kelistar flared to life and she saw the level brows, the fierce blue eyes, the twin scars running the length of his beloved face. As confused familiarity turned to joyful recognition she leaped to her feet and flung herself into his arms. The sword clanged to the stone as he caught her and held her tightly, stroking her hair and kissing her temple and whispering reassurances.
For a time she only clung to him and wept. But after a while the storm receded, and she realized what she was doing, what she was already beginning to feel again, and warned herself to pull away, to keep her distance.s Instead she turned her head to lay her cheek against his chest, listening to the powerful beat of his heart and admitting finally that she was never going to be able to stop loving this man. His gloved hand, which had been stroking her hair, came to rest now upon her head, his lips upon her brow, and she felt the current of the Light rise up between them.
“Are you all right?” he asked her finally.
“Yes.”
“They didn’t—”
“They were saving me for Belthre’gar.”
She felt him stiffen, felt his arms tighten around her. Then his breath came out in a long, low sigh. “Oh, Mad,” he murmured. “I never should have sent you away . . . it was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. And Eidon’s mercy alone has brought you back to me. I will never, of my own choosing, let you go again.”
Everything in her went still as she recalled again the Kiriathan informant’s claim that Briellen had been caught in adultery and sent away in disgrace. Which meant Abramm was free to marry someone else.
Before she could even get her mind around that fact and its many repercussions, however, Trap and two others burst into the chamber. She stepped out of Abramm’s arms and saw Xemai slumped glassy-eyed against the wall in a pool of his own blood. Abramm’s men looked at the corpse, as well.
Then Trap said, “We’ve taken this grotto, sir. But almost half of their galleys got out.”
Abramm nodded and said something to that, but Trap’s words had jolted Maddie
’s brain back into the here and now. “The guardstar,” she cried, stepping back from the king. “They took it from Avramm’s Landing and threw it into the harbor.”
Abramm frowned at her. “Are you sure it was a guardstar?”
“It looked exactly like the one at Graymeer’s. Same pebbled skin, same black streaking . . .”
She hurried back to where the orb had been dropped, the men following after her. “Right here,” she said, stopping at the dock’s edge. “They dumped it in here, canvas wrapper and all.”
As they stood staring down into the water, Trap suggested they’d need a diver, and Abramm agreed, though obviously that would have to wait until the situation was more settled. Then Channon arrived to report that one of the other grottos had been secured, and shortly after that Katahn was hurrying in.
Maddie dropped back to let them work, seating herself on the top of a piling and letting her eyes rove freely over the man she thought she would never see again. He looked much the worse for wear. His clothing was almost as wet as hers, torn and spattered with blood and mud. The dark pigment he’d used on his hair had faded in places, letting the blond come through in an uneven mottling, and the swarthiness on his face was likewise smeared and uneven. She didn’t care. If anything it made his eyes bluer.
His men didn’t care, either. She could see the awe, the deep respect in which they held him—perhaps greater now than ever. She loved to watch him work with them, for it was obvious he held them in high regard, as well, and did not seem to notice that they worshipped him. This day would birth another legend, another song, which perhaps this time she would be able to write.
The rise of her warm feelings stuttered as she recalled their reunion in the storage chamber, when he’d held her in his arms and promised he would never send her away again. Fear stirred within her. He couldn’t marry Briellen now. And since it was possible—even likely—Chesedh had been shamed enough to drop that part of their requirements for the treaty . . . it meant he was free to marry someone else. The fear coalesced into a cold hard lump. Like, maybe . . . herself.
She backed away from that thought with a sudden panicked denial, turning her eyes from him and noting for the first time what bobbed on the water beside the dock.
“Oh!” she cried, sliding off her piling perch. “It’s come up on its own. And it seems to have lost its skin.”
Abramm, though deep in conversation with his men, was obviously still attuned to her, for the moment she had spoken and moved, he broke off to glance at her. She pointed, and he looked down at the smooth, luminescent gray sphere floating at his feet, almost as if it, too, had come to report itself to him.
For a moment no one said anything. Then Abramm stepped aside as Channon dropped to his knees and grabbed for it. But every time he tried to lift it, it slid back into the water.
“I canna keep hold of it,” he said. “ ’Tis too slick an’ heavy . . . though how it’s floatin’ I canna say.”
Trap looked at Abramm gravely. “Perhaps you should try it yourself, sir.”
So the king stripped off his gloves and knelt on the edge of the dock, reaching down to pull out his guardstar as easily as if it were a glass buoy. All were suitably amazed. Especially when he handed it to Channon and it obviously grew heavy again. Not nearly as heavy, Maddie thought, as when the Broho had tried to handle it, but not as light as when she had carried it, either—a fact whose significance now made her spine tingle with a sense of portents.
She caught Abramm looking at her, the blue of his eyes so magnified by the water’s light they almost glowed. Or perhaps it wasn’t the light, but merely the first time she’d ever looked at him and seen his feelings for her so openly displayed.
And suddenly she could not look him in the eye any longer, stirred by his regard in a way she had never thought to be again, and terrified by the decision she realized she would soon be asked to make. I don’t want to be a queen, my Lord. I can’t be. I’m not suited. I’ll ruin everything. This cannot be my destiny. It cannot.
CHAPTER
32
Abramm’s campaign to take the Gull Islands was a resounding success. Once Leyton arrived with his six ships and full broadsides of cannon, it was only a matter of time before the battle was won. When it ended, they had captured twenty-five galleys—including the one that had just come through the corridor—along with the nearly seven hundred slaves that powered them and over five hundred Esurhite soldiers, many of them injured. By Abramm’s figuring, five vessels had been destroyed in the fighting and another ten had escaped either before Leyton arrived or soon after, each of them loaded with escapees, including the Brogai lord, Uumbra.
Though Leyton sent several ships after them, they soon encountered the cloak of mist again and had to turn back. Meanwhile Abramm set about cleaning the island of the dead and establishing his own command post there. Before he left, he gave orders that the cove should be transformed into a series of dry docks where construction of new galleys could begin, leaving behind almost half the slaves, the smallest of the sailing vessels, and a guard of ten of the captured galley ships.
The other fifteen galleys he brought home with him, parading into Kalladorne Bay with the cannon at both fortresses firing and every boat in Springerlan turned out to form the victory gauntlet. Katahn’s original galleys led the way, followed by those captured at the islands, the prisoners forced to stand on their decks, bound and stripped down to breeches, as was Kiriathan custom with prisoners of war.
Abramm followed in the flagship of the five Chesedhan frigates that had returned with him, Maddie at his side, Leyton, Trap, and Katahn standing around them. Cheering spectators filled the boats that lined their way, tossing hats into the air and waving aprons and coats and homemade pennants bearing Abramm’s dragon-and-shield device. Flags flapped in the breeze as bands played from the decks of the welcoming ships, producing a constant stream of music from one end of the bay to the other. When Abramm reached the midway point, shore-launched rockets screamed into the sky, exploding in blossoms of sparkling color as throughout the city bells rang and all people filled the streets in celebration.
Once ashore the prisoners were marched to Wetherslea and thrown into the deepest dungeon. Many were offered the opportunity of receiving the Star, but few accepted. Meanwhile the slaves who had formerly rowed in the galleys Katahn had given Abramm at his coronation were freed, while the sailors from the Kirithian navy who’d volunteered to row with them were released from the service and paid handsomely. Then after a few days of suffering the hardships of Wetherslea, all the Esurhite soldiers healthy enough were pulled out and chained to the oars in their places.
The stolen guardstar was sent back to Avramm’s Landing and set on its platform, unlit but ready should Eidon deign one day to reveal the secrets of how it worked. For now, Abramm had something more important on his mind: Maddie.
Since her return, Maddie had become something of a people’s celebrity as the stories of what had befallen her on Chakos and what she had done to save the guardstar circulated ever more widely. Perhaps it was the hideousness of the affair with Briellen, or the fact that many of the common people knew her, thanks to her two years of roaming the inns and byways of the city in her search for information about the Pretender. Or maybe it was the fact that everyone knew by now that their king was madly in love with her and had gone to the Gull Islands himself primarily to rescue her. Like it or not, she had become a part of the legends surrounding him, and people wanted to see them together. Even his privy council voted to accept her as First Daughter and to ratify the treaty between their two countries by a marriage after all. Ironically, the only remaining obstacle to Abramm’s dream being fulfilled was Maddie herself.
He knew Leyton had told her of the First Daughter option shortly after they’d taken Chakos. At which point she’d shut herself into the quarters that had been provided for her on the island and avoided Abramm as assiduously as Carissa ever had. Yes, she’d stood dutifully beside him on the
deck of the Chesedhan flagship for their homecoming, but she’d spoken to him only as required, and that with cool formality. Once they came ashore in Springerlan she virtually disappeared from public life.
For the first three days, he was busy enough he had no time to think of her and the proposal he had made to her through Leyton. But on the fourth, he awoke restless and uneasy, wondering why she hadn’t answered him. Had he hurt her more than he thought? Had she not understood his rationale as much as he supposed? On his morning ride through the green hills and newly leafed-out trees of the royal preserve, he spoke at length to Eidon about it. He’d originally declared that he would stay out of it, giving her the same freedom to decide that his Lord was. Would it now be a violation of that decision to summon her and ask what was going on?
By the end of the ride he had concluded that it would be and was resolved to rein in his impatience and wait it out. Eidon would bring him the answer in his own time, and he would trust in that. Thus he was startled—even shocked—to return to his apartment and have Haldon inform him a young woman was waiting for him in the study. Even then he had the half-cocked notion it would be someone else—Leona, perhaps—and so was schooling himself not to show his disappointment as he walked through the doorway. But it was, indeed, Maddie who stood at the window, her back to the room as she stared out over the valley and bay below.
Seeing her was shock enough, but even more disconcerting was the heat that flared through him. One that sprang not from embarrassment or fear but from sudden and intense desire.
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