“What do you want?” The words were spoken in a gravelly, hoarse voice.
I squinted into the dimness of the room, crossed my arms over my chest, feet a shoulder’s width apart. A soldier’s stance.
“What do you want!” Borund barked, his free hand slapping down onto his desk with a hard crack as he surged to his feet, not quite stable.
I didn’t flinch, didn’t move. I met his eyes, met the rage there with a steady gaze, and said simply, “You ran.”
He jerked back, face contorted with shock as if I’d reached out and slapped him, the reaction magnified by his unsteadiness.
I walked across the room, set my own hands down flat against his desk, felt the stickiness of spilled wine beneath my palms, and leaned forward, directly into Borund’s face. His eyes widened, the rage gone. The reek of stale, used-up liquor came thick on his breath, had been ground into his skin. He looked ten years older than he was, his flesh hanging on his bones, the wire glasses askew on his nose.
“I was there,” I spat, letting all the rage I’d felt in that moment come through in my voice. “I watched through your eyes as the Chorl ships rammed the docks, watched as William took up the battle cry and led the Amenkor men over the barricade to meet them. I watched as you stood there, staring, unable to move, and I felt your heart falter.
“And then I watched you run. I watched you abandon William to the Chorl.”
Horror widened Borund’s eyes further. His mouth opened, then closed. Opened again. “I—” he began. I could see his pulse throbbing at his throat, in a blood vessel on his forehead. Sweat coated his skin in a thin sheen. His gaze darted away, searched the room in a panic, and then settled back onto me. “Oh, gods,” he whispered.
And then he collapsed back into his chair. Tears streaked down his face, and his body shook with silent sobbing. “I couldn’t,” he heaved, voice strangled, barely there. “I couldn’t. I tried. I tried to turn back. But I just kept running. I didn’t even know where I was going.” His face contorted. “I’m sorry, Varis. So very sorry.”
The emotion on his face was too raw, too visceral. I pushed back from the desk, an empty wine bottle on its side shifting position at the motion. I stared down at it a long moment, thought of William, of what Borund’s cowardice had done to him. I glanced around at the rest of the bottles throughout the room, and then I moved to one of the shaded windows.
I stared at the material of the shade—deep red, suffused with sunlight from behind—and said, “Then do something about it.”
Borund’s sobbing caught. “I can’t,” he said viciously, the anger aimed at himself, his voice thick with phlegm. “The attack is over. There’s nothing I can do to change it now.”
“You can’t change what happened,” I said. I reached up and pulled the shade back, sunlight spilling into the room with a harsh glare. Borund sucked in a deep breath at the light, almost a hiss, but I ignored him, moved to the rest of the windows and jerked all of the shades aside, opening the windows, fresh air spilling in with the sunlight, sharp with spring and sea salt.
I turned to face Borund, hands on my hips. “But you can attempt to redeem yourself. For me. For Amenkor, which needs you now more than before Alendor and his consortium, more even than before the Chorl arrived. But especially for William.”
Guilt flashed across Borund’s face and he slumped even farther back in his seat. “William,” he whispered.
I took a step forward, halted. I no longer felt the seething rage over his cowardice on the docks, but I was still angry. It would take more than a few words and some sobbing to change that. Like William, the forgiveness wouldn’t come easily.
“You’ve lost him, Borund.”
Borund stared at me from across the room, mouth open, one hand raised to shade his eyes against the sunlight, as the words sank in. “H-How?” he finally stammered. “How can I redeem myself? There’s nothing—”
“You can build ships,” I said, cutting him off. “Lots of ships.”
* * *
“Now that the wharf is repaired, we can begin working in earnest on the repairs to the surviving ships,” Regin said.
We stood at the edge of the wharf, people streaming around us, mostly workers hauling rope and carting wood out to the ships tied up at the docks to either side of us. But there were some fishermen, crab traps slung across their backs, their skin tanned into a thick hide, their hair bleached by the sun. There were also shopkeepers from the upper city; peddlers and hawkers; the dark-skinned Zorelli that made up the majority of the ships’ crews; and one or two others from outside the main coastal regions. All these people had survived the winter in Amenkor and were trying to start anew. Sailors bellowed from the rigging, and crew called back and forth across the decks, the sounds accompanying the creak of the new planking beneath our feet and the slap of waves against the wharf’s supports. Birds wheeled in the air—gulls and terns, one or two pelicans—their shrieks blending into the general noise. The scent of fish and brine clung to the air, the breeze coming in occasional gusts from the ocean. At least seven ships had been brought in to the docks, most still with damage to be repaired.
“When will the first ship be ready to send out?”
Regin snorted. “We could send out a few trading ships immediately, but none of them are equipped to defend themselves against the Chorl. Their captains aren’t exactly leaping at the chance to leave the relative safety of the harbor.”
“Not even to trade to the north?” So far, there had been no evidence that the Chorl were ranging farther north than Amenkor. All of the attacks on trading ships last summer had come to the south, between Amenkor and Venitte, along the main trading routes between the two sister cities.
Regin shook his head. “Not even to go north to Merrell. They’re waiting for us to upgrade their ships, or to finish repairing the warships the Chorl left behind so that they have an escort ready to defend them.”
I turned to look toward where three of the Chorl ships were also docked, their decks swarming with carpenters and engineers. Regin looked in the same direction.
“Our carpenters are drooling over them,” he said. “I’ve already sent a few to check them out in detail. They seem to think they can adapt them somehow. Something to do with their construction.” When I gave him a questioning look, he shook his head. “Don’t ask. I’m a merchant, not a shipwright.”
I wasn’t either. In fact, I’d never even been on a ship. Gutterscum from the Dredge typically never made it down to the wharf. Most never made it across the River that separated the slums from the lower city.
That was changing though. There was less of a divide between the city and the slums now.
“How long before we can provide the trading ships with an escort?” I asked.
“By the end of the week. We should have three of the Chorl ships ready to go by then. If we send one with each trading ship, that should allow me to send two ships and Borund one.”
At Borund’s name, I tensed, frowned. Even though I’d spoken to him two weeks before, had practically ordered him out of his stupor, I still felt anger boiling beneath the surface. I’d seen him on the docks, had seen him in the warehouse district taking stock of his supplies. But I hadn’t seen William and Borund together yet, had met with William repeatedly. I hadn’t mentioned Borund, and William had carefully sidestepped the issue whenever it came up.
Borund hadn’t proved himself yet. And I hadn’t forgiven him.
“He was raised to be a merchant, not a warrior.”
I turned to meet Regin’s eyes, startled. He watched me with calculated intent. I suddenly wondered where Regin had been during the attack, wondered what he had done. He’d been assigned to one of the barricades in the lower city, but I’d lost track of him during the attack, too caught up in events to watch everyone.
But Regin had changed. Before the attack, he’d hated me, hated how
I’d seized control of the food and supplies, how I’d set up the kitchens and warehouses. He’d helped me only grudgingly as I tried to feed the city.
“Borund should have stayed to fight on the docks,” I said, my voice level. “He should have stayed with William.”
Regin didn’t waver. “Not everyone was made to fight. Not everyone was built for survival. Mistress.”
Regin held my gaze a moment more, then looked away.
“In any case, William has handled all of Borund’s affairs since the attack, while Borund was . . . otherwise occupied. And he’s done a splendid job of it. Since Borund and I are the only surviving members of the merchants’ guild of any consequence, I was thinking of making William a full merchant in his own right, perhaps a few of the other apprentices as well. The guild needs to begin recovering from Alendor and his consortium. What do you think?”
I thought of William charging into the advancing Chorl, sword raised awkwardly before him. I thought of my first excursion to the middle ward at William’s side, saw his face as he gazed longingly at the merchant shops and manses that had lined the streets, and smiled. “I think he’d like that.”
Regin grunted, a faint smile touching his own lips. “And I think he’d like you to come to the ceremony.” At my frown, he gave me a knowing look. “And I need to go see to my own estates, which are still in total disarray after the past winter. I assume that now that winter is over, and the city has survived, all of the merchants have free access to do their usual business? No more joint warehouses? No more communal kitchens?”
“No. The merchants’ guild is free of the palace. But I do intend to keep the warehouse and kitchen running on the Dredge. They need it.”
Regin raised an eyebrow but said nothing except, “Mistress.”
He gave a slight but respectful bow, then moved off, a few waiting apprentices and personal bodyguards closing in around him as he merged with the crowd on the docks. My own escort moved in closer, Keven coming up to my side.
“Good news?”
“More or less. Trading ships should be ready to leave by the end of the week.”
“Then might I make a suggestion?”
I turned to him, somewhat surprised. “What?”
He motioned to the people milling around us. “We just barely survived a harsh winter, were attacked by an invading force, and we’ve done nothing since but clean up, repair, burn the dead, and drill the citizens in case of another attack. Can’t you feel the tension?”
I frowned, and for the first time took note of the faces of everyone around us, of their haggard appearance, the set of their shoulders. As if at any moment they expected the facade of normality to cave in, revealing a horde of Chorl behind it.
And if I slid beneath the river, I could feel it as well, a trembling beneath the calmness of activity. The citizens of Amenkor were holding together through sheer movement, keeping themselves busy so that they didn’t have to think, to feel.
“We need something to celebrate besides mere survival from the attack,” Keven said.
“Such as?”
“A festival to celebrate the launch of the first trading ships, perhaps? It doesn’t have to be a huge event, but . . .”
I gave him a narrowed look of doubt. “I suppose we could spare a little extra food for a festival.”
Keven grinned. “I’ll let Avrell know immediately.”
Behind Keven, I saw the crowd part, Captain Catrell moving forward, trailing an escort of his own, including Darryn. Catrell was dressed in the full armor of the palace, having been promoted, taking the place of Baill as the head of the palace guardsmen. He was a short man, Darryn at least a foot taller, and carried himself with a sense of serious reserve.
Darryn was dressed like any other denizen of the Dredge, except that beneath his somewhat used and frayed clothing he wore leather armor and carried a sword. He’d been offered Catrell’s old position as captain of the regular guard, but had turned it down and remained captain of the militia instead, insisting that he’d be more useful on the Dredge . . . and that full armor would only isolate him from the people. Since he was training them to defend themselves from another Chorl attack, no one had argued with him. He came forward a step behind Catrell, a smirk on his face.
“Mistress,” he said, half mockingly, bending at the knee with an exaggerated bow.
Catrell gave him a sidelong frown, then nodded himself. “Mistress.”
“Captain. Lord of the Dredge.”
Darryn snorted. “At your service, of course.”
I signaled Keven, the escort shifting position to open up a path through the crowd as I led Catrell and Darryn down the wharf toward the southern jut of land that protected the harbor. The two captains fell into step to either side, their own entourage melding with mine.
“I wanted to discuss Amenkor,” I began, and both Darryn and Catrell became instantly intent. “In particular, what more we need to do to defend it against another attack. I know that you’re training anyone with a will in the marketplace so that the citizens can defend themselves if necessary, Darryn, and that you’re also training the more formalized militia, but there has to be something more substantial that can be done.”
Catrell frowned. “You’re certain that the Chorl will return?”
“They’ll return. If not here at Amenkor, then somewhere else on the Frigean coast. Marlett, Temall, Venitte—any of the southern cities are under the Chorl threat. Merrell to the north as well, to a lesser extent. The Chorl will be desperate. Their homeland has been destroyed, and there are too many of them to remain on the Boreaite Isles for long.”
“So what can we do?” Darryn asked.
We’d reached the end of the wharf, were passing now through the trailing edge of the warehouse district, coming up on the wall that branched out from the inner walls of the city and ran down the full length of the narrow strip of land that struck out into the water. The crowd had fallen behind, most of the city’s activity centered on the wharf and the ships there. I stared up at the wall. Here, it was barely twice my height, its main purpose to keep an eye on whatever ships might be approaching the city from the ocean on the far side.
“We need to warn the coast, the southern cities especially,” Catrell said, angling along the wall to where a small gate allowed access to the heights.
I nodded. “Avrell has already sent dispatches overland, since no ships have ventured out of Amenkor since the attack.”
“But it could take weeks for them to arrive,” Darryn protested. “By then, the Chorl may have already struck somewhere else.”
“I know. It’s the best we can do at the moment.”
Both Darryn and Catrell mulled this over as we climbed the stairs to the top of the wall, emerging into a stiff breeze from the ocean. Patrols ran in regular intervals along the wall, the guardsmen taking a moment to acknowledge our little group as we passed before turning back to their scrutiny of the ocean and the search for sails and the possibility of the Chorl’s return. We were headed toward the remains of the watchtower at the end of the jut. I wanted to see the damage. Before the attack, I’d ventured out onto this wall only once. It had been at the limits of the throne’s influence, and had been extremely uncomfortable, like knives digging into my gut, so I hadn’t returned.
But now that the throne was dead . . .
I shoved the thought aside.
“What do you have in place right now?”
Catrell drew in a breath, then exhaled as he shook his head. “The losses from the attack, and those guardsmen that disappeared along with Baill, were significant. But I’ve set up watches along both walls in case the Chorl decide to return. Since the watchtowers were destroyed in the battle, I’ve set up warning bells down the lengths of both walls as well. If any foreign sails appear, they give warning to the city, with a second set of signals once the danger of the ship
has been established. Darryn has been drilling the citizens on what each signal means, and what they should do in the event that a ship does approach. Most will head to the walls and the palace, although anyone with training or who can pick up a weapon is supposed to help defend the harbor.”
“That covers the ocean approach,” Darryn cut in abruptly. “What about to the east? An attack from land?”
Catrell grimaced. “That’s harder to defend. Aside from the walls surrounding the palace, there are no defenses to the east. We haven’t needed them. The eastern portion of the city—the stockyards, the tanneries—”
“The Dredge,” Darryn added sharply.
Catrell nodded in agreement. “—they’re all exposed. Along with all of the fields and farms, of course. I’ve set up scouting patrols along both the northern and southern roads, a few along the eastern route as well. The southern approach is the most easily defended, since the terrain is such that they’d have to climb a cliff to reach the edge of the palace in that direction. But the northern and eastern routes . . .” He shrugged.
“The good news is that most of the citizens of Amenkor have moved inside the walls of the palace or into the outskirts of the slums along the River,” Darryn said into the silence. “With the lower city between the wharf and the palace mostly destroyed, they’ve had to find somewhere else to go. A significant portion of them should be protected by the walls if someone does attack by land, and with enough warning, those on the Dredge should be able to make it to the walls in time. There’s not much we can do about the outlying farmland. All of that is at risk.”
“Haven’t the patrols here and on the roads stretched the guardsmen thin?” I asked.
“Yes. But since the battle we’ve had a significant surge in men and women interested in the militia.”
Darryn nodded. “Many of those come from the Dredge. They may not be skilled with a sword, but they make up for it with nastiness and determination.” A tight, proud smirk lit Darryn’s face.
“Many of those who joined the militia before the attack have been shifted to the regular guard to fill the gaps, since they had some minimal training already. The rest have already started training under Darryn and his men.” Catrell shrugged. “There’s not much more that can be done.”
The Throne of Amenkor Page 77