Spymaster

by Margaret Weis

  “I suppose we have to salute the bastard,” he said.

  “Unfortunately, yes,” said Henry.

  “Signal from the Terrapin, sir!” shouted a midshipman.

  “That will be Alan, wanting to know what’s going on,” Randolph remarked.

  The Terrapin was raising and lowering signal flags at such a furious rate that the midshipman on board Valor responsible for reading them could scarcely keep up.

  “What do we tell him?” Randolph shouted as the Valor fired her cannons, returning the salute.

  A gust of wind almost took off Henry’s hat. He grabbed hold of it as the smoke from the cannons blew past.

  “You tell Alan he is not to start a war,” Henry shouted back.

  “Must I?” Randolph asked, frowning. “We could sink three of those frigates before they knew what hit them.”

  “Not even you and Alan can take on the entire Guundaran naval force,” said Henry. “We don’t want trouble. I will handle this with diplomacy. Once this storm ends, I will go ashore and meet with the Braffan council as planned.”

  Randolph looked grim. “I’d like to give that bastard Ullr diplomacy—in the form of a broadside!” He glanced sidelong at the prince and lowered his voice. “What about HRH? You were planning on taking him with you.”

  “To be humiliated? I won’t give the Braffans or Ullr the satisfaction,” said Henry. “Besides, I still have one card to play—Simon and the crystals. We know the formula and the Braffans don’t. Something may come of that.”

  “Not bloody likely,” Randolph grunted.

  “Always the optimist,” said Henry.

  “Realist, old chap,” said Randolph. “Realist.”

  “I have to tell the prince about the change in plans,” said Henry, sighing. “Let me know when the wind has died down and you think it’s safe to go ashore.”

  Randolph nodded and turned back to closely observing the Guundaran ships.

  Henry signaled to Mr. Sloan, who had remained discreetly in the background and now advanced to meet him.

  “You heard the news, Mr. Sloan?”

  “Yes, my lord. Most unfortunate.”

  “I have been outwitted by King Ullr, a barbarian whose mental processes are taxed by trying to decide what to have for dinner!” Henry said bitterly. “He fooled us into thinking his blasted fleet was sailing to Morsteget, when in reality they were sailing for Braffa. And now I will have to go ashore and meet the old fart and listen to him gloat.”

  “We do have the crystals,” said Mr. Sloan.

  “That we do, Mr. Sloan. The Tears of God. Tears that are more valuable than diamonds.”

  “Will I be accompanying Your Lordship?”

  “Yes, Mr. Sloan. I’ll need you to take notes when I meet with the Braffans. You prepare for the journey. I must go speak to His Highness.”

  The rain had stopped and the wind had shifted. The storm had passed, though a few ragged clouds still boiled overhead. Henry was crossing the deck when a blinding flash of purple lightning streaked down from the sky, striking so close he could smell the sulfur. The lightning was accompanied by a nearly simultaneous thunderclap and the sickening sound of rending and cracking wood.

  The mainsail boom crashed down onto the deck. Prince Jonathan disappeared beneath a tangle of rope, splintered wood, and sailcloth.

  TWO

  Time distorted for Henry. He watched the broken boom fall, the sails crumple, the rigging twist and cascade downward, all with such agonizing slowness that every moment was imprinted on his brain.

  The prince vanished amid the wreckage, and suddenly time accelerated, with subsequent events happening in a confusing blur. The sight of Mr. Sloan rushing past him, shouting for help, jolted Henry to action.

  He ran to join Mr. Sloan and the others as they worked frantically to free the prince. Some grabbed axes and knives. Seeing this, Randolph shouted that no one was to start chopping until they knew what had become of the prince, and try to determine his location.

  Henry peered through the wreckage and thought he caught a glimpse of the boat cloak the prince had been wearing.

  “I see him,” Henry cried. “He’s not moving. Your Highness! Jonathan!”

  Everyone waited in anxious silence. There was no response.

  “Clear away this bloody mess!” Randolph ordered, grabbing hold of a length of rope and hauling it off.

  They worked feverishly to remove the tangle of sail and rope and splintered wood and eventually found the prince lying beneath the boom, which had fallen across his chest.

  Jonathan was unconscious, his face deathly pale and covered with blood. For a terrible moment Henry feared he was dead. The ship’s surgeon felt for a pulse and announced that His Highness was alive. The good news caused the sailors to raise a cheer. Randolph summoned the strongest men on board ship, and together they lifted the heavy boom and held it steady until Mr. Sloan, under the surgeon’s direction, was able to grasp the prince by the shoulders and gently and carefully drag him to safety.

  They placed Prince Jonathan on a litter and carried him to his cabin. Henry stood by, feeling helpless, while the surgeon and his mate stripped off the prince’s clothes. Henry noted that the surgeon looked grave as he poked and prodded. The prince had an ugly cut on his head and a large purplish red bruise on his chest.

  Completing his examination, the surgeon was more optimistic.

  “His Highness is very lucky. He has two broken ribs, but his skull remains intact,” the surgeon reported. “His lungs were not affected.”

  Prince Jonathan regained consciousness moments later, wondering where he was and what had happened. When the surgeon asked him if he could move his feet, the prince obliged.

  “No damage to the spine, Your Highness,” said the surgeon. “I predict a full and complete recovery. I will give you laudanum for the pain and to help you rest.”

  “I will remain with His Highness,” said Henry.

  The surgeon eyed him. “No, you won’t, my lord. Not with those hands of yours resembling sides of beef. You come below with me.”

  Henry looked at his hands and was surprised to find he had ripped most of the skin off his palms, leaving them bloody and raw. He accompanied the surgeon to the sick berth. The surgeon applied a healing ointment, bandaged his hands, and recommended rest and brandy.

  Mr. Sloan accompanied Henry to his cabin, then left in pursuit of brandy. He returned to find Henry attempting to change clothes and having a difficult time of it.

  “What are you doing, my lord?” Mr. Sloan asked.

  “Dressing for my meeting with the Braffan council,” said Henry. He scowled at the bandages on his hands, which prevented him from doing the simplest tasks, such as buttoning his trousers.

  “Be reasonable, my lord,” Mr. Sloan said. “You have missed the meeting which was scheduled for ten of the clock. The time is now almost noon. And the surgeon said—”

  “Devil take the surgeon and the clock!” said Henry angrily. “I must speak to the Braffans. Help me on with this blasted shirt and give me some of that brandy.”

  Mr. Sloan frowned his disapproval, if he didn’t speak it. He assisted with the shirt and waistcoat and frock coat, wrapped a boat cloak around Henry’s shoulders, then poured some brandy into a tin cup. Henry drank it at a single gulp.

  “Have the pinnace waiting for me, Mr. Sloan. I will pay my respects to His Highness and then join you on deck.”

  Henry found Jonathan sitting up in bed. The prince made light of the accident.

  “My own damn fault, really,” said Jonathan. “I should have gone below when the storm hit. As it is, the surgeon says I shall be up and about in a few days.”

  “I am thankful to hear that, Your Highness,” said Henry. “With your permission, I would like to proceed to my meeting with the Braffan council. I can remain here, if Your Highness has need of me—”

  “No, no, carry on,” said Jonathan. “I saw all those Guundaran ships in port. I gather something is amiss.�
��

  “Hopefully to be set to rights, Your Highness,” Henry replied.

  “Do you think the Guundarans are breaking the neutrality pact, Sir Henry?” Jonathan asked, frowning.

  “I should not like to venture to say, Your Highness,” said Henry.

  “But you think it likely,” said Jonathan. “Good luck and a safe journey, my lord. Report to me on your return.”

  Henry bowed and took his leave. He found the crew of the pinnace waiting for him. Mr. Sloan had already boarded, and he assisted Henry to his seat. The boat was small, designed to ferry supplies, crew, and passengers to and from shore. The helmsman inflated the single balloon and then sent magic flowing from the brass helm to the air screws and the lift tanks. The pinnace rose from the deck of the ship with a slight lurch and then sailed toward the pier.

  Henry thrust the shock and the upset and the stinging pain of his palms out of his mind. He would need all his faculties to deal with the Braffans. He did not say no, however, when Mr. Sloan offered him another gulp of brandy from a small pocket flask.

  As they approached the harbor, Henry saw two people, both of whom he recognized, standing on the pier in the shelter of a boathouse. One was a middle-aged woman in a rain-soaked bonnet. The other was a tall, broad-shouldered man in a military uniform and a plumed gold-braid-trimmed bicorn. They had apparently been about to board a pinnace of their own. Seeing Henry’s approach, they had seemingly decided to wait.

  “What are those two doing on the dock?” Henry wondered.

  “I would hazard a guess that since you did not attend the meeting, they were about to sail to the Valor to speak to you,” Mr. Sloan suggested. “Do you know them, my lord?”

  Henry grunted. “The woman is Frau Aalder, a member of the Braffan council. She was with me at the refinery the day the Bottom Dwellers attacked. She formed a bad opinion of me during that incident—not entirely unwarranted I must confess, given that Alan and I threatened to sink the ship on which she was sailing.

  “The tall man with all the medals and gold braid and plumed bicorn is His Majesty, King Ullr Ragnar Amaranthson of Guundar. I have no idea how he came by the medals. As far as I know the man has never seen combat, if you don’t count the duels he fought in his youth.”

  The pinnace docked, the crew lowered the gangplank, and Henry and Mr. Sloan stepped onto the pier. Henry walked across the dock to meet Frau Aalder and the king. Mr. Sloan remained at a distance, yet keeping close enough to hear the conversation. Mr. Sloan could not take notes, for this conversation would be unofficial and off the record. But he had an excellent memory and would make a record of it later.

  Henry bowed to the king and gave Frau Aalder a curt nod.

  “I apologize for my late arrival,” Henry said. “Our ship was struck by lightning with the result that I was unavoidably delayed. We can now proceed—”

  Frau Aalder interrupted. “The meeting is over. Ullr and I were coming to tell you. You know Ullr, of course. What the devil did you do to your hands?”

  Henry stared at the woman, disgusted at her gauche remarks, and pressed his lips together to keep his rising anger in check. He saw no need to reply. Frau Aalder was considered rude, even by the relatively relaxed mores of the Braffans. King Ullr cast her a glance of disdain and tried to make up for her crudeness.

  “We were sailing over to the ship hoping to visit Crown Prince Jonathan,” said King Ullr, speaking passable Freyan with a thick Guundaran accent. “We were going to invite His Highness to dine aboard the Prinz Lutzow this evening.”

  “I am certain His Highness would have been glad to come, Your Majesty, but unfortunately the crown prince is indisposed,” said Henry.

  “I am sorry to hear that,” said King Ullr. “Perhaps another time. We wanted to tell His Highness how much we enjoyed reading his book. Perhaps you can pass along—”

  “Never mind about books now, Ullr!” said Frau Aalder, who had been impatiently tapping her foot during the niceties. “The council originally agreed to meet with you, Wallace, to discuss Freyan offers of help to rebuild our refineries. Such help is no longer required. Braffa is now a protectorate of Guundar.”

  “Protectorate!” Henry repeated, amazed.

  “As you know, we have no standing military of our own,” Frau Aalder continued. “Our nation is too small to fund one. Guundar has offered to establish a naval base on Braffa, and to assist us to build up our defenses. During that time, their ships will patrol the refineries and our coastline.”

  Henry saw triumph gleam in the king’s eyes. In that moment, he would have given a great deal to see a boom fall on King Ullr.

  Henry kept his face expressionless as he considered his response. An outward show of anger could reveal Freya’s desperate need for the money from the sale of the crystals. To say nothing of the fact that the Freyan navy required the liquid form of the Breath of God in order to condense it down to manufacture the crystals. Anger could hurt his cause. He decided to respond with the sorrow of someone who has been betrayed by a friend.

  “I trust the Braffan council realizes, Frau Aalder, that such an agreement breaks the terms of the Braffan Neutrality Pact,” Henry said. “Freya made that pact in good faith which, I am sorry to discover, was apparently not shared.”

  King Ullr gave a derisive snort. “Neutrality pact be damned! You came to Braffa, Sir Henry, hoping to persuade the council to allow your government to take over the refineries. We have simply beat you to the punch, as your Freyan pugilists say.”

  Henry turned a cold eye upon the king. “Since I am not to be permitted to speak to the council, you will never know, will you, Your Majesty?”

  Frau Aalder intervened with the exasperated air of a governess separating naughty boys. “As for breaking the neutrality pact, that’s rubbish. Guundar is acting to enforce the pact that you planned to break. So, you see, Wallace, you have no reason for complaint and so you may inform your queen.” Frau Aalder plucked at King Ullr’s gold-braided sleeve. “We should leave now, Ullr. I am certain Wallace is eager to return to his ship before another storm hits.”

  “We see no storm in the offing, madame,” said King Ullr. Stepping away from her reach, he walked closer to Henry. “And our business with Sir Henry is not concluded.”

  “Yes, it is,” said Frau Aalder irritably. “I have nothing more to say to Wallace.”

  “But we do, madame,” said King Ullr, fixing her with an imperious stare.

  Frau Aalder glowered and fumed, reminding the king that he wanted to make an inspection tour of the refineries. King Ullr was not to be deterred from speaking to Henry, who found this altercation between the two intriguing. Frau Aalder was clearly trying to whisk King Ullr away. Henry wondered why, and the next moment he had his answer.

  King Ullr, brushing aside Frau Aalder, drew near Henry until they were practically toe-to-toe, attempting to use his height and bulk to intimidate him. “We have heard rumors that the Braffans developed a crystalline form of the Breath known as the Tears of God. What do you know about such crystals, Sir Henry?”

  Before Henry could reply, Frau Aalder literally pushed her way into the conversation, shouldering between the two men. “I have told you, Ullr, that those rumors are completely unfounded.”

  As she said this, she shot Henry a warning glance from beneath the brim of her bedraggled bonnet and very slightly shook her head, urging him to silence.

  Henry responded with a derisive smile, reminding her that he knew the rumors were not all unfounded. Frau Aalder grew grim.

  “We did conduct some research,” she admitted. “But the experiments failed and the program was halted. No need to ask Wallace. He knows nothing about it. And now we really must leave, Your Majesty. We have that inspection tour scheduled…”

  King Ullr had seen Henry’s smile and was not to be deterred. “Our agents tell us that the Rosians unexpectedly came into possession of several barrels of these crystals that do not exist. I suppose it was a coincidence that the appearance of the
crystals in Rosia occurred immediately after you, Sir Henry, and your friend, Captain Stephano de Guichen, visited one of the Braffan refineries. The captain is reputed to have used the crystals to raise an enormous fortress off the ground and sail it Below. And yet you claim to know nothing of any of this.”

  “I was in Freya at the time, fighting my own battle with the Bottom Dwellers, Your Majesty,” said Henry grimly. “As for Captain de Guichen—now the Duke de Bourlet—he is a Rosian and thus no friend of mine. He is, however, a close friend to King Renaud and a hero to the Rosian people.”

  Henry paused, then added in milder tones, “Perhaps I should remind Your Majesty that King Renaud is a signatory to the Braffan Neutrality Pact and that His Majesty will be extremely displeased to hear of Guundar’s interference. The Rosian navy is dependent on the liquid form of the Breath to fuel their ships. I doubt King Renaud will be pleased to hear of this new ‘protectorate.’”

  “I find it hard to believe that you know nothing about these crystals, Sir Henry,” King Ullr insisted stubbornly. “Captain de Guichen could not have flown a massive stone fortress to battle at the bottom of the world without them.”

  “And I find it hard to believe that you are coming perilously close to calling me a liar, Your Majesty,” Henry said angrily.

  “Actually, Ullr, you are calling me a liar!” said Frau Aalder, glaring at both men. “I told you Wallace knows nothing about the crystals! We are late for our appointment.”

  Frau Aalder might be rude and crass, but she was also clever, counting on the fact that King Ullr could not afford to offend her, the representative of his new ally. King Ullr realized he had gone too far and he was forced to let the matter drop.

  “Forgive me, madame,” King Ullr said in frozen tones. “Such was not my intent.”

  “I should hope not,” said Frau Aalder, sniffing. She was actually almost cordial to Henry. “We will be in touch, Wallace. The council knows the importance of the Blood of God to the navies of the world and we hope to resume production as soon as possible and get it out on the market.”