Spymaster

by Margaret Weis

  Mr. Sloan did not hesitate. He saw the path before him as clearly as though God Himself was shining the light of His countenance upon the way.

  “As it happens, Captain Smythe, I, too, fear I will be forced to leave Freya because of my faith,” said Mr. Sloan in sorrowful tones. “My current employer is a blasphemer and an infidel. I fear the loss of my immortal soul if I remained in his service. I would be glad to find different work.”

  “Something in the military line?” Captain Smythe asked. “You were an excellent soldier, as I recall.”

  “Thank you, sir, you are most kind,” said Mr. Sloan. “I would be glad of a chance to return to active duty.”

  “Then we are well met, Mr. Sloan,” said Captain Smythe. “Well met, indeed.”

  FIFTY

  The surgeon on board the Soleil examined the gash on Kate’s head. She sat on a stool in the sick bay, her wrists and ankles shackled, barely able to think over the throbbing pain in her head.

  The ship was headed for the Rosian port city of Maribeau to deliver the prisoner. Their progress was slow. The ship had been caught in a storm and forced to reduce sail. Kate could hear the rain pounding on the deck, hear the howling of the wind in the rigging.

  “You are lucky,” the surgeon said.

  He was working by the light of a lantern suspended overhead. The light was swinging back and forth with the motion of the ship in the storm winds.

  Kate stared up at him. One of her eyes was swollen shut, her jaw ached, and she could barely see for the blood that covered her face.

  He gave a tight smile. “What I mean is, the blow did not crack open your skull. To stitch up the wound, I must shave your head.” He added with a shrug, “The guards in the prison would do that anyway so they don’t have to deal with lice.”

  He took out a straight razor and began to sharpen it on a leather strop.

  “I want to see the captain,” Kate mumbled through bruised lips. “My ship crashed on an island below the Breath. There could be survivors.”

  The surgeon bent over her, putting the razor to her head. “Hold still, please.” He started to shave, then paused as a violent gust hit the ship. “Drat this wind!”

  Kate grabbed hold of his hand, manacles clanking.

  “I want to see the captain!” she repeated.

  The surgeon exchanged glances with the marine detailed to guard her, then turned to his loblolly boy and spoke to him in a low voice. Kate heard the words “feverish” and “agitated,” presumably describing herself. The loblolly boy dashed off. Kate slumped on the stool. The winds calmed and the rain stopped. The surgeon shaved her head and she watched with dull, uncaring eyes as her blood-gummed blond curls landed in a heap on the floor or in her lap.

  “Dirty dishwater,” she murmured with a half smile.

  The captain took his time. The surgeon had stitched up the wound and was saying it should heal cleanly, when the captain entered the sick bay. Kate was still sitting on the stool and he stood staring down at her with contempt.

  “What do you want?” he asked.

  What Kate wanted was to wipe that sneer off his face. The bastard had given orders to fire on her ship after her crew had surrendered. Never mind that the surrender had been a ploy to buy time. He didn’t know that. She had to swallow her anger, however. She needed him.

  “Send a boat to rescue my crew,” she said.

  “Your crew are in hell,” he said. “Which is where you are headed.”

  Kate shook her head and winced at the pain. “I heard the ship crash. There are islands below the Breath. I know. I was a wrecker. There might be survivors.”

  “Your ship was destroyed,” the captain said. “And you will soon hang.”

  He turned and started to leave.

  Kate tried to jump up, but she tripped over the leg irons and landed on her belly on the deck. She reached out as far as the manacles on her wrists would allow and was able to grab hold of his boot.

  “Please!” she pleaded. “I beg you! I don’t care about myself. Just save my crew!”

  He stared down at her as he might have stared down at a plague-carrying rat.

  “Get her off me,” he said.

  Two marines seized hold of her and dragged her away.

  “Sorry, sir,” said the surgeon. “She’s feverish.”

  The captain pulled out a handkerchief, cleaned his boot, and stalked out.

  The surgeon and the loblolly boy placed Kate on a cot, where she lay with her eyes closed. Her head throbbed, but that was nothing compared to the searing pain in her heart.

  “If your crewmembers are stranded on an island in the Deep Breath, they won’t survive long,” said the surgeon.

  “My crew can,” said Kate. “Akiel knows a special kind of magic. He will keep them alive. I just need to find them.…”

  The surgeon only shook his head. “Delirious.”

  Kate stared at the wooden planks above the cot. Wild ideas roamed her fevered brain. She would overpower the marine, steal his rifle … hold the captain at gunpoint … sail back to rescue Olaf and Akiel and Marco …

  They are waiting for me. They know I won’t abandon them. They believe in me …

  She could use the chain attached to the manacles to choke the marine, wrap it around his neck.

  First she had to stand up.…

  She found herself face-first on the deck.

  “I have to save them,” Kate murmured, as the surgeon and the loblolly boy bent over her.

  They laid her back on the cot and there was Morgan, standing over her, gazing down at her.

  “How can you save them, Kate?” he asked with a shrug and a smile. “You can’t even save yourself.”

  FIFTY-ONE

  The storm rolled into Haever during the late evening hours, bringing dull, plodding, soaking rain, the type that could settle in for days. The pale light from the streetlamps glistened on wet pavement. The horses splashed through small lakes that formed in the intersections, and the carriage wheels flung water high into the air.

  Henry’s mood matched the weather, gray and somber. He was returning home late from the palace after a meeting with Her Majesty that had not gone at all well.

  Queen Mary was an energetic woman, fond of hunting and riding. Even in her middle years, she still rode to the hounds and jumped fence rails with the best of them. She was intelligent, but not a deep thinker. She could not understand that sometimes, instead of charging ahead, she should patiently wait and watch.

  “We need to be doing, Henry!” Queen Mary had told him, stamping her words with her clenched fist into her palm. “Doing! Not moping about.”

  Henry had good reason to mope. The Travian dragons had agreed to remain in Freya for the time being, on the condition that the murderer should be swiftly apprehended. Their discontent grew with every day that passed without an arrest. The question of the heir to the throne remained unsettled. The queen remained obstinately fixed on her sister—the one married to the Rosian—and stubbornly refused to listen to the howls of protest rising from all quarters.

  King Ullr had been particularly offensive on his trip to Freya. He had gone around Henry and met with the dragons, offering them “safe haven” in Guundar. Despite that, Henry had found some pleasure in Ullr’s visit. Henry had asked the king in the blandest possible tone if Ullr had heard the rumors that the Braffans had discovered barrels of a crystalline form of the Breath. Ullr had been furious. He did not know for certain that it was Henry who had stolen the crystals right out from under his nose, but the king certainly suspected as much. The memory of Ullr stomping out of the meeting could still bring a smile to Henry’s lips.

  His smile was fleeting. The members of the House of Nobles were being more useless than usual. Paralyzed with indecision, they were unable to act on measures that might have eased the financial crisis. Rioting continued in the streets. The Anti-Dragon League was holding rallies every night.

  Freya was lurching from one disaster to the next and Henry ha
d been strongly tempted this night to ask the queen just what he should be “doing.” She was angry enough with him, however, and he had held his tongue and let her scold him.

  The carriage rolled up in front of his town house. The hour was late, the house dark. Since Henry came and went at all hours and sometimes spent the night at his club, he had given orders for the servants not to wait up for him. He entered the silent house, deeply regretting the absence of Mr. Sloan. Henry felt his secretary’s absence as he would have felt the loss of his right arm.

  He hung his sopping-wet cloak and hat on the coat stand, lit a candle, and quietly walked up the stairs to the second floor. As was his habit, he went first to the nursery. Nanny slept in the back of the room. He could hear her snoring from the hallway and he took off his shoes so as not to wake her and bring down her wrath upon him.

  Young Henry had graduated from the cradle and was now sleeping in a bed with wooden side bars to prevent nighttime excursions. He lay on his back, his face flushed, his hair tousled. He clutched a toy wooden soldier, given to him by Alan, from which he would not be parted.

  His son had kicked off his covers. The night being damp and chilly, Henry set the candle on the mantelpiece and solicitously drew the blanket up around his son’s chin. He removed the soldier and, bending low, kissed his sleeping son on his forehead.

  He then padded soft-footed to the cradle where his infant daughter lay on her back with one small fist in her mouth.

  “I thought I heard you, my love,” said a soft voice.

  He looked around to see Ann enter the room. She was dressed in her long white nightdress and nightcap, her hair parted in the middle and neatly braided. Stealing up to him, she twined her arms through his and rested her head on his shoulder.

  “I am sorry to disturb you, my Mouse,” said Henry softly.

  “I was wakeful and listening for you,” Ann whispered. “How wet you are! Your shirt collar is soaked. You must change your clothes before you catch your death.”

  “A little rain will not kill me,” said Henry. “Your aunt the queen is the one who will do me in.”

  “My poor Henry,” said Ann. “Is she being very terrible to you?”

  “No more than I deserve,” said Henry lightly. He would not burden his wife with his troubles.

  He kissed Ann’s cheek and they both stood gazing at their baby. Her tiny mouth was curved in a bow. Long eyelashes swept her cheeks.

  “She grows more beautiful every day,” said Henry.

  “Henry, she is bald as an onion,” Ann said, teasing.

  Outside the wind moaned among the eaves. The rain beat on the windowpanes. Henry reached his arm around his wife and drew her close.

  “I had a strange fancy, standing here, my Mouse. I imagined my love as a halo of light flowing from me, encircling you and our children, keeping us all safe.”

  “A lovely fancy, my dear,” said Ann.

  “I wish it were real,” said Henry. “In truth, I feel more like the driver of a carriage that is careening out of control while the crazed wyverns snarl and snap and bite each other.”

  “Not as bad as that, my love,” said Ann. “I trust in your first vision. I believe in you, Henry. Now come to bed. You can do nothing to fix the world tonight.”

  Henry picked up the candle and held it high, so that a small white halo surrounded him and his Mouse as they walked to their bedchamber.

  FIFTY-TWO

  The port city of Maribeau had been founded by the Rosians over one hundred fifty years ago, following their victory in the Blackfire War. It was now one of the largest cities in the Aligoes and also one of the wealthiest. Three forts manned by more than a thousand soldiers guarded the harbor entrance and protected Rosian interests in the islands.

  The Soleil had arrived during the night after a voyage of about three days. Rosian marines escorted Kate from the ship to the prison in the largest of the three forts, Fort Saint-Jean, located on Point La Fierte du Roi.

  Kate was the only female housed in the military prison. The commander had to send for one of the nuns who worked in the infirmary to bathe and dress her in women’s prison garb—a long white linen gown that extended from her neck to her ankles. The nun took her shoes, leaving her barefoot, to deter escape.

  Kate was given a cell to herself with a guard posted outside day and night. The cell was small, only a dozen feet in either direction. The walls were whitewashed stone covered in magical constructs that would prevent any crafter housed in the cell from using magic to escape. An iron-banded, magic-locked wooden door had a small hatch that the guards could open to check on the prisoner. The cell was furnished with a cot with a straw mattress, and a chamber pot.

  Kate spent the rest of that night sitting upright on the bed, afraid to close her eyes. Whenever she fell asleep, she would slide into a horror-tinged dream of flame and screams and splintering wood. She would wake with a start and a gasp, bathed in sweat. The next day, she paced her cell for hours, back and forth, back and forth, with occasional stops to yell for the jailer. At first she demanded to speak to someone in charge. When her demands were ignored, she tried pleading and begging. Those did not work either. At least this night, when darkness fell, she was so exhausted she slept soundly.

  The next morning, another storm rolled in. Rain drummed on the roof and, above the wind and thunder, she heard the sound of hammering outside her cell. She paid little attention to it. She was thinking of her crew and wondering how long Akiel’s spellcasting could keep them alive. A key rattled in the lock. A guard opened the door to admit a Rosian military officer.

  Kate looked up. Her head was shaved and bloodied, her face bruised and swollen. The guard walked over, grabbed hold of her arm, and yanked her out of bed.

  “Stand up,” he ordered.

  “Katherine Gascoyne-Fitzmaurice,” the officer pronounced in formal tones.

  Kate eyed him warily. “That is my name.”

  “You have been tried in a military tribunal and found guilty of piracy.”

  “Tribunal? What tribunal?” Kate demanded angrily. “I was not present at any tribunal and I am not a pirate! I am a privateer for the nation of Freya! I hold letters of marque.”

  The commander smiled, thin-lipped. “If you had letters of marque—which I doubt—they are at the bottom of the world and will do you no good. The punishment for piracy is death by hanging. The sentence will be carried out at dawn tomorrow. They are now, as we speak, building the gallows in the courtyard outside. I will send a priest to you at midnight. May God have mercy on your soul.”

  He walked out. The guard followed, shutting the door and locking it.

  “Keep your bloody priest!” Kate shouted.

  She couldn’t see but she could imagine workmen crawling over the large wooden structure, pounding nails, erecting beams that would hold the rope, installing the trapdoor on which the prisoner would stand with the noose around her neck. When the trapdoor was released, her body would fall through it, tightening the noose. If she was lucky, the noose would break her neck. If not, she would die slowly, doing the “hempen jig,” jerking and writhing in agonizing pain and terror as she dangled at the end of the rope.

  She sank onto the bed, shivering. Hugging her knees to her body, she listened to the workmen building her death.

  “I am my father’s daughter,” said Kate through trembling lips. “I meant well. Morgan meant well. When things went wrong, which they almost always did, he would say, with that charming smile of his, ‘I meant well.’”

  Kate had idolized her parents and she had continued to do so, even as she had come to realize that her mother, Rose, had been weak-willed. Raised to be indolent, she had lived in a halcyon dream from which she could not escape.

  Her father, Morgan, had also lived in a dream, confident that the next spin of the roulette wheel or the next shipment of contraband would bring him the genteel life of a gentleman he knew he was meant to lead.

  Rose had never loved Kate. Sometimes she regarded
her in bewilderment, as though she could not fathom how this child had happened to fall into her life. Morgan had loved his daughter in his own careless way. He could just never figure out how she fit into his dream.

  Kate had no reason to be proud of such parentage, and every reason to be ashamed. When Olaf had tried to teach her better, she had laughed at him. She thought back to Stephano de Guichen, who had been prepared to sacrifice his life to save her—a nobody. He had set her an example of what it meant to be honorable and courageous. He had told her to fight for her dreams.

  She had fought. And she had lost. And it had all been her fault.

  She had been reckless, heedless, and impulsive. She had left herself open to Coreg’s threats, put herself in his power. She could tell herself that she had gone along with him because he had threatened her and those she loved. She wondered if that was true. Or was it an excuse to absolve herself of blame?

  In the end, she had tried to right the wrongs by seeking evidence to expose Coreg and had ended up being framed for murder.

  Her father’s daughter. The sound of the hammers beat time to Morgan’s song: There’s no luck about the house. There’s no luck at all.

  She had meant well. But now her friends were dead or dying and she could do nothing to save them. She couldn’t save herself.

  Kate pictured the remains of her ship lying among the trees and rocks of some sunken island, like the corpses of the other wrecks she had worked. She imagined Akiel holding Marco’s lifeless body, releasing his soul. She imagined Olaf dying, calling out for her. She saw the scrap of paper pinned to the wall of the cabin, the scrap the young girl had kept and treasured for so many years, charred and blackened, soaked in blood.

  Kate rolled onto her stomach, buried her face in the straw mattress so no one would hear, and began to sob. Her sobs were gulping and ugly. She sobbed for Rose and she sobbed for Morgan and for her friends. She sobbed until she had no more tears and even then she could not stop. At last she lay quiet, curled up in a ball. The storm had ended.