by H. N. Klett
“Now what you have on your hands must be something quite extraordinary. You were so engrossed when I saw you at the market, and the cover looked so elaborately made. I would dearly love to look at this tome.” He let his mouth savor the word, like a wine rolling it out dramatically.
“I-I-I don’t have it.”
“Not with you? A shame.” He shifted almost playfully in his chair. “Then again, it would be bad manners to bring a book to a tea party, wouldn’t it?”
He snapped his fingers over his head and took a sip of tea. The automaton servant appeared by his side holding a book. Her book. The red eyes of the skull stared blankly at her and she couldn’t help but gasp.
As if he read her mind, he jumped in.
“Ah! What do we have here? I see that we have your mother’s primer after all!”
He took the book from the servant and dismissed him.
“Let’s take a look at this.”
He turned it over in his hand, admiring the silver and iron works that held it shut.
He scrunched his nose and looked at her. “Kind of odd for a lady’s primer, isn’t it?” He held up the book to her, pointing out the skull. “I mean the skull is quite unladylike, don’t you think?”
Hailey couldn’t move. She could only look at the book tumbling in the bishop’s hands as he inspected the silver and iron clasps that kept it shut. She wanted it. She needed it back in her hands. She wanted to reach out and grab it from him.
“I do have to say, though, it does look rather interesting. Let’s take a look inside, shall we?” Staring intently at her, he handed the book to her, all the while never breaking that toothy smile.
Hailey leapt at it, snatched the book out of his hand, and embraced it. She felt a slight sense of relief to be holding the book. Seeing it in someone else’s hands bothered her in some unexplainable way. She looked down at it. She wanted to take it and run, but she knew that there were more than likely guards just outside the doors. If they knew where she hid her book, she was sure that they were watching the house and Grandmother Rose. Her father at the guild as well. There were very few places the Crown did not hold sway and even in those places the churches heard confessions regularly. The book was right. She was in great danger.
Bishop Graver sat there patiently expectant. He sat back in his chair and steepled his hands in front of him. He slowly raised an eyebrow at her.
She hated herself for it, but like a good little girl, she did as she was told and touched the skull. The latches sprung open. The bishop sat back up and extended a hand out to her. She reluctantly handed the opened book back to the bishop.
Taking the book, he leaned back in his chair. “Lovely!” He began to leaf through the pages, all of which were still blank. Page after page, the words would not come. He looked up at her.
“So much fuss over a book you cannot read.” His face fell in mock disappointment as he sat up promptly and slapped the book shut. “Oh well. The Queen told me I wouldn’t be able to read it, anyway.”
The comment hung in the air for a long moment. Hailey was stunned.
“She’s the one who sent me, you know. She had a feeling that the book would come here. Find its way to you.”
Recognizing the surprise on her face, he continued.
“Oh, yes, the Queen of the Veils knows exactly who you are.” He smiled at her and reached for his tea. “Your father, too, and most of those he affiliates with. There aren’t many secrets that she isn’t privy to, I’m afraid. I was her chief confessor and even I was amazed to hear the amount of secrets that the Veiled Lady knows. No doubt she is watching us even now.”
Hailey looked around and saw that the room was still empty save for her and Bishop Graver, who now looked at her coldly over his tea.
“Don’t worry. You will see her when the time comes. I’m sure that the two of you will have plenty to discuss.”
He shifted in his chair a bit, still keeping his eyes on her.
“It was good of you to accept my invitation. It has been most delightful. I will have to tell your grandmother how exceptionally well behaved you were.”
He waved his arm in the air. Behind Hailey, the door creaked open and there was the sound of heavy feet approaching behind her. The closer the feet came, the more her heart sank.
“It will provide her with some comfort after we tell her that you and your father have been taken into custody for contraband and conspiracy against the Crown.”
She made to get up, but the two guards that stood to each side of her pushed her back down in the chair.
Bishop Graver took a bite of another cookie and poured himself another cup of tea. He placed the cup on the saucer after a long and satisfying sip.
Hailey felt waves of despair washing over her as the large, gruff hands rested on her shoulders. At that moment, she realized how foolish she was. She should have listened to the book. She should have listened to the young man. Even her grandmother was afraid, even though she didn’t say it directly. Why had she come? To please her grandmother? To protect her status? Because it was what a young lady was supposed to do? Even she didn’t know. All she knew now was that she would be paying the price for her indecision earlier. She should have followed the boy into the crowds and taken her chances.
The bishop addressed the two guards.
“See to it that she is placed on board the Halifax right away. The Queen will want her for questioning.” He waved again and snapped his fingers at the guard. “See that it’s done quietly. No need to raise any attention. We don’t want any unrest.”
He took the book and handed it to the other guard. “Give this to the boat’s captain and be sure that he keeps careful watch on it. The Queen wants that book in her hands as soon as possible. Now off with you.”
The towering guards lifted Hailey to her feet and she tried to utter a scream, but she was instantly muffled by one of the guards holding a rag over her nose and mouth. A pungent scent stifled her scream and the room began to swirl. She swooned, and the guards hauled her up on her feet and began to drag her along. Just before she passed out completely, the bishop addressed her one last time as she was being dragged from the ballroom.
“Lovely having tea with you, my dear!”
Jacob Graver grinned to himself warmly as he took another sip of tea and reached for another cookie. After placing it in his smiling mouth, he savored it almost as much as he did his victory.
The guards loaded Hailey into the royal carriage and climbed on board. The great steel horses began to pull them down the lane. The great crowds parted as they slowly trotted through them and down to the docks where the Crown ship, Halifax, was waiting to take her to the Queen.
Chapter 12
In the dark of the Halifax’s hold, all Hailey could do was feel sorry for herself. She had awoken with her hands chained around a post. She didn’t know how long she had been out, but it must have been a while because the boat was well underway. Having traveled out of the port with her father so many times, it was easy to tell that the boat had made it past the calm cove and the breakwaters and was making its way out to the sea.
Her eyes grew accustomed to the dark and she saw that the hold of the ship was surprisingly empty—only a few crates and herself were on the floor. She sat up as much as she could, the length of chain long enough that she could sit up and even stand, but not much else. Her body ached; she stretched as best as she could, but the chains had little give. On her arm was a sticky patch with a tube that lead to a bag suspended from the top of the pole. She pulled the sticky patch from her forearm, and tossed it and the tube aside. She then checked her hair for pins to pick the locks, but they were gone. They had taken them all.
Hailey noticed that there were lights in the hold, the same globe style found in her room, but the crew must have shut them off when they set sail. She thought it must have been done more out of cruelty than to save energy.
She had heard her father talk several times about Crown ships, with their odd,
dark conical sails. Those sails somehow helped produce a limitless magical power that gave them lights, navigation, even communication over long distances. They didn’t need large and cumbersome batteries like the devices that merchants had. The sails would just pull the energy out of the sky just the same as the wind that furled the sail.
He would rail for hours on how useful it would be if merchants had access to such things instead of just the Queen’s ships. Some of her father’s friends had secretly tried to figure out these devices, but they turned out to be far too complicated for them. Even some of the wisest of tinkerers couldn’t figure out what they were made of, for nothing like it existed in nature.
Her father! She gasped and began to panic. Bishop Graver said before she blacked out that he was going to have her father arrested for contraband and conspiracy as well. They were both hanging offenses.
She had no idea how long she had been asleep and on the ship. In the time she was away her father might have been tried, found guilty, and executed. Was her father still alive?
Large, bitter tears rolled off her cheeks and she began to sob.
After a while, the tears subsided and she resigned herself to her situation. There was nothing she could do to save her father, let alone herself. All she could do now was survive as long as she could and see what happened when she went before the Queen.
Above decks, she could hear the shuffle of feet and the voice of the captain booming over the ship, giving instructions for the midday routine. Before the announcements were finished, the lights in the hold began to burn brighter. Hailey’s eyes tried to adjust.
She heard the sound of keys rattling in a lock, and in the growing light she could make out a set of stairs just off to her left. A pair of large, ill-fitting boots descended them. They belonged to a short, portly, gray-bearded man who was carrying a tray of food. He waddled down the stairs and made his way over to her. He stood and looked at her for a long moment through his round, rimless glasses as she sat there on the floor glowering up at him.
“Ah, such a shame, seein’ such a lovely girl so sad.” He shook his head. “Touches me heart.”
His accent was rough and difficult to understand. He pronounced his words strangely, as though they were foreign to his tongue. It was as if he puzzled over the words as soon as he said them.
“Cap’n said you’d be awake by now, said I should bring yer something ta eat as yer might be hungry. Yer been asleep a good while now. I knows, Cap’n sen’ me to check on yer yesterday.”
“How long have I been asleep… Mr. uhhh…?” She looked at him, hoping that he would fill in the rest. He looked at her dumbly a moment, then nodded his head as though he got the message.
“Gibson, me name’s Gibson, though most folks call me Gibby. We left port three days ago. Yer quite the sound sleeper! Never seen anyone sleep li’ tha’ before.”
Three days. Her father could be long dead by now and she was a three days’ sail away. She felt a new rush of tears begin to well in her eyes, but she bit her lip to stifle them. She had given them enough tears already. Much to her distaste, Gibby noticed.
“Aww, no sense cryin’ abou’ it. We shouldn’t be in port after long.” The man placed the tray on the floor before her. “Here, have some food. I’m sure yer hungry.”
Hailey couldn’t even look at the tray.
“Suit yourself. Yer know it gets pretty dark an’ lonely down here in the hold. Maybe I should stay down here an’ keep yer company.”
He sat on the floor by her and the tray.
From up the stairs, a voice boomed throughout the ship.
“Gibby, please report to the quarterdeck. Gibby to the quarterdeck.”
Gibby sighed and rubbed both hands along his smooth, bald head. “Guess it’ll hafta be ‘nother time, little missy.”
He got up slowly, grunting as he negotiated his way off the floor around his round belly. Once back on his feet, he began to waddle back towards the stairs. Before he went up, he turned back to her and said with a smirk, “Bes’ eat that. It’s not like yer goin’ anywhere fer a while.”
He proceeded up the stairs and closed the door behind him. The lights dimmed back to the way they were before. Hailey was left to the solitude of the ship’s hold and her thoughts.
The first day, she did not touch the food, her guilt and sadness robbing her of her appetite, but the next day she leapt on the food and tore into it with her bare hands, devouring the small cuts of meat as though a savage. After not eating for four days, she was close to eating the tray itself. They were wise to not give her any utensils. Had they, she probably could have used one of them to work the locks around her wrists.
Sometime later—midday, Hailey guessed, from the shuffle on the upper decks—the man known as Gibby came and brought another tray of food, this time with a larger portion. Hailey was glad for this, for the lack of food left her weakened. Food would help her regain at least some of her strength.
Blessedly, his visit was brief, but not brief enough for Hailey’s liking. Though the man looked harmless and though he might have possibly been a little slow, there was something dark and wanting in his cold look at her. His eyes lingered just a bit too long. It made Hailey uneasy.
The days passed between sleeping, eating, and quiet contemplation. Thankfully, on one of his visits, Gibby had brought her a chamber pot so she didn’t have to behave like livestock and do her business on the floor.
Gibby was the only person she saw. She sat there for hours, days, staring off into the dim light of the cabin and thinking of how she had gotten there. What decisions had brought her to be chained in the hold of a ship on her way to stand before the Queen. Finding and taking the book. Deciding not to tell her father about it. Getting caught up in the mystery of it all instead of just getting rid of the stupid thing. She regretted most of all not listening to the book and her instincts. She should have escaped with the boy when she got the chance.
She let her mind play out the possibilities of what would have happened if she had done things differently. Like a good navigator, she plotted out the courses of every outcome, every decision. What if she had never taken the book? The Crown would have had the book and taken her father anyway. But they wouldn’t have taken her, would they? She would have been free to try to save her father.
She couldn’t get over the way Bishop Graver looked at her. She contemplated it for a long time, trying to figure it out, until it dawned on her what that look meant. Familiarity. He also said that the Queen knew her, knew that the book would come to her. Why would the book come to her? How? If so, did that mean that the Crown would have kidnapped her anyway?
Had she listened to the book or the young man and ran, she could have found any of a dozen ships putting out for distant ports that morning. Once underway, she could have gotten word to her father that she was safe and left instructions on how to join her. Her father’s merchant guild had contacts everywhere. Any one of them would have been glad to secretly pass along a message, if not hide them altogether. She would have been safe. Her father would have been safe. The book would have been safe, for the time being, at least.
Just thinking about the book made her brain itch. She felt the same panic a mother feels when she loses her child in the crowd at the market. Over and over in her head it called out to her, and Hailey could not go to it. Its cries went unanswered.
None of this would have happened if she had listened to the book and the young man. So why didn’t she do it? Why did she freeze in place when she should have been running away?
The answer came in the voice of her grandmother clucking in her head. The endless litany she would tell Hailey about the duties and the responsibilities of being a lady. To serve, to submit, both to their elders and to men of stature and status. Her grandmother, in sync with the Church and their schools and primers helping hammer in the virtues that forged the chains that bound her now. Rather than defying those virtues and being her own woman, she’d submitted to the things that she
did not like or understand to make her grandmother and father happy.
She had seen so much sorrow in her family when her mother died, especially in her father. She recalled how he would sit there, hours at a time, silent and still, as if waiting for death. It had driven her to constantly try to make him and everyone around her happy. Now she hated that incessant need to please others.
Hailey also thought about the state of the world. It had not always been like this, no matter how hard the Crown and the Church tried to wipe away the record. She had read the histories of it from long before she was born. Men and women were equal and free, even the redheads, once. There was a republic and a senate, where men and women had an equal voice in the world in which they lived. That ended when the first king seized control some 250 years ago. And with each passing year and each passing monarch since, the Crown’s grip grew tighter and tighter.
There was a rebellion by the colonies some 50 years later after the Crown was established. They fought to restore everyone’s freedoms and abolish the Crown, but failed. Wanting to be sure to avoid another insurrection by the common folk, the Crown formed an alliance with the Church of the Ancestors to ensure that both remained in power, uncontested.
They designed a system that created a constant thirst for wealth and position that was woven through the very fabric of their society through the Church. The Church ran everything that the Queen did not. They printed the books, they ran the schools, and they ran the spiritual lives of everyone. The Queen may have control of their bodies and wealth, but the Church owned their hearts and minds.
One of the core beliefs the Church taught was that a lady’s place was to be a servant to men and her elders. They preached salvation through status and wealth. It was the litany of a system that supported the Crown—mind, body, and soul, all born in the time of the first Ancestors who fell from the sky.
Hailey thought of the book and one important thing it had told her. That she wasn’t alone. There was a pirate queen once, a captain on the high seas who defied the Crown and was their scourge. She made a difference. That book was proof of it. Even though she didn’t have the book with her, she had the knowledge of its existence. It was a small treasure within herself telling her that her heart wasn’t wrong. She could be something other than a wife. She could be the captain she always wanted to be someday if, like the Pirate Queen Rachel, she fought for it.