The Rose Sea

by S. M. Stirling

  The storm was dying down. Morning had come at last, grey and bleak—but even that dull light filled Karah with hope. She saw the dark line of land ahead—the waves were washing her toward it.

  She was alive, and she was not alone. For the moment, that was enough.

  The ship was going down. Amourgin dodged a falling mast and looked frantically through the darkness for some sign of Eowlie. The pimp as likely as not had thrown her overboard. She was probably already drowned, or lying with her throat cut in the hold. But what if she weren't?

  The men and women of the XIXth streamed toward the one dinghy, as the ship settled further onto the rocks. They crawled over the tangles of downed rigging, the buckling planking—clambered into the little work boat, and started pushing.

  There wasn't going to be enough room for even part of them, Amourgin noted. He wasn't about to get into the middle of that mess.

  He ran for the corner of the aftcastle where he'd had his hammock, and dug around in the debris until he found his rucksack. It held his book, his magic supplies, a spelled knife, and a flask with water in it, among other things. He'd need whatever he could get.

  Supplied as best he could manage, he went back on deck—in time to see several men pitch a bag of something out of the dinghy and swing the boat over the side. A whole herd of panicked men and women climbed in and let the boat down by pulley—Amourgin noted that Sergeant Ddrad had taken command, and Mercele was enforcing it, and between the two of them, they'd restored order.

  He made his way to the bag, which in the faint light of coming dawn seemed to be moving. He tried not to let himself hope—it was as likely to be extra supplies as the bundle he hoped to find.

  The ship heaved, the bag kicked, and he heard a muffled groan. He pulled his beltknife out of its sheath and slit the bag open, careful not to cut the contents. Eowlie came up at him, eyes wild. He jumped back; the action was mere reflex, but he decided his reflexes were good. She was angry enough to kill.

  The pimp hadn't been taking chances with Eowlie, Amourgin realized. He'd bound her wrists and ankles and then tied them together, gagged her, wrapped her muzzle shut—then stuck her in a bag. Amourgin looked forward to telling Eowlie the pimp was dead. Later.

  He cut the ropes that bound her and untied the cloth gags. He was cautious—he admitted to himself that for all the odd attraction he felt for the woman, he was more than a little afraid of Eowlie, too.

  She studied him, her expression unreadable.

  "Can you swim?" he yelled.

  She gave an affirmative nod but said nothing.

  "Good. We're going to have to. Ship's going down.'"

  She held out her hand, her yellow eyes staring at him all the while, and he pulled her to her feet. She was far lighter than he would have thought. She placed one hand on his chest, slid her claw-tipped fingers up to the hollow of his throat, and then wrapped both arms around him. He pulled her tight against his body, ran his hands along her hard-muscled back down to the tight, hard curves of her buttocks.

  She licked along his neck and the back of his ear—her tongue nearly dry, warm, the slightest bit rough. He groaned and pulled back. There is something about a shipwreck makes a man horny as a stag in rut, he thought. Must be the wish to die happy. But, his body's urges to the contrary, he preferred to live—and get laid on dry land. He pointed to the low side of the ship.

  He pointed out a good-sized piece of debris, she nodded, and both of them jumped over the side of the ship together.

  * * *

  Willek lay in her cabin, enjoying the gentle rocking of her warship. The day had dawned bright and fair, with no hint of the storm that had raged through the night. The tiny globe of wizardlight that indicated the continuing existence of the Sea Mare had just flickered and died Her fleet was the victor in the battle with Darkist—at least before the storm struck—and though she would have to see to repairs and refitting here in Cnit before she took her fleet south and finished the bastard off, she had the funds and the manpower to see that the job was done well.

  The refits would take—oh, not more than several weeks. Her spies told her Darkist's fleets had scattered like jackals before a lion, limping back to Tarin Tseld. What was left of them, in any case. The bloodstone showed her scenes of the Tseldenes rioting in the streets, massing to overthrow Darkist, burning the nobles in their homes as news of Darkist's defeat spread The scenes were as fine as anything she could have wished for—and better than she would ever have dared hope to receive. She would finish off whatever resistance she found when she reached Darkist's domain. The rest of the realm of Tarin Tseld was preparing to welcome her as its rightful ruler.

  Shemro's Strekkhylfa dynasty was at an end, and Darkist's as well. Willek decided she would style herself Majestic Deity of the Two Empires.

  The only niggling worry besetting her was that she had not been able to identify all the extra players in her little military exercise. Darkist's spells had been plain enough a magicless moron could have marked them. She'd noted the craft-signatures of one of the Tykissian underground people as well—but that was to be expected Her sisters work was right in the thick of things—and Willek had to admit Szoae's interference surprised her. Szoae, like the spiders she reminded Willek of, did not usually go out after prey. She preferred to spin wide webs and let it come to her. But Willek could not deny the presence of Szoae's spellworking in the battle. She was unsure of her sister's intent or of what she'd accomplished, but the motherless fiend had been there. That left three major players Willek had never so much as come across before, any one of whom had twice the power of Darkist. She couldn't guess their purposes, she couldn't divine what they'd done, and now that they were gone, she couldn't even discern any difference their magic had made on the course of the battle.

  That much power combined with that sort of subtlety left a bad taste in Willek's mouth.

  Just a minor bad taste. She wasn't about to forget she'd won.

  She thought it might be pleasant to create a little victory-sending to dispatch to Darkist. Something small and unobtrusive—perhaps a spell to age him further. He looked like he was dancing at Death's table already—a little thing like that could push him the rest of the way over. Certainly it wouldn't hurt.

  That can be a bit of entertainment for this evening, she decided, and got up to prepare to review her troops.

  The grandcabin of the Falcon was in the usual place at the stern, one level down from the poopdeck, with big fantail windows over the ship's rudder. Two long eighteen-pounder bronze guns occupied some of the space; they were lashed home now, but the smell of powder smoke still lingered amid the gilded woodcarvings and hangings. A long table split the cabin from fore to aft, with the Admiral's bunk on one side of it and a desk with cubbyholes, bookshelves and map boards on the other. At that moment the table was crowded with men and women in the uniform of high rank or in priests' garb, many of them wounded and bandaged, all of them looking tired enough to collapse.

  The Grand Admiral shuffled through the last of the papers. "About four thousand lost, then," she said. "Troops, that is; maybe two thousand sailors, mostly pressed civilians on the transports."

  "My lady," the general replied, with a stiff bow of his head. There were red semicircles of exhaustion and strain under his eyes.

  "The Tseldenes undoubtedly lost more than that," Willek said thoughtfully.

  Several of the squadron commanders seated about him nodded vigorously. "If we didn't sink a third of their tonnage, I'm a pariah," one hawk-faced man with the tattoos of Old Tykis said. There was grey in his braids. "These frigates… I take back everything I've said, they're a terror to galleys."

  "And we rode the storm better than the southrons, too," another naval officer said.

  Willek leaned back in the tall padded leather chair. The storm might have been natural or a byproduct—there were so many spells flying back and forth that women would be dropping wolfcubs and flowers starting to sing for years on every island about.
The ferocity of it had still been to her advantage; most of the Tykissian ships were built to take the outer oceans, while the Tseldene fleets were designed for the gentler waters of the Imperial Sea.

  "We'll call it a victory, then," Willek decided.

  She turned her head to look out the windows, blinking at the fierce sunlight The coastline of Meltroon lay a thousand meters off; between the flagship and the shore were scores of other vessels, and more drawn up on the shelving beach for emergency repairs. The sound of hammers and saws mixed with shouting, cursing, and the splash of oars as longboats shuttled about with coils of rope, barrels of pitch, tools, and workmen. Beyond the beach and the military road that lay along the coastline, hospital tents had gone up to tend the wounded, and foraging parties were cutting ripe grain and sugarcane as fodder for the animals aboard the transports.

  "Two more days, and everything that can float heads south," she said decisively. That'll be all then, gentlefolk. "To your commands—Shoddo, Lord Pelkar, Brigadier Multin, your Reverence, please stay."

  She waited until the others had left, then rose and pulled a short black archwood rod from beneath the pillow of her bunk. It was plain except for brass buttons on the ends; there was a muted -pop sound as she touched it to the four corners of the room.

  "Safe now," she said.

  "Are you a traitor or not?" the man in the embroidered buckskins and ear-to-ear tonsure of a War Priest of the Three said, fingering the archaic tomahawk at his waist.

  Willek snorted mentally behind the impassive mask of her face. Fanatical dedication was all very well, and it took a true fanatic to successfully infiltrate the Church of the Three. The thought of what they'd do to a secret follower of the One of a Thousand Faces discovered penetrating the mysteries made even Willek wince a bit But the priest took it entirely too seriously; also he'd picked up the odd ideas the southrons had about women, and answering to her made him deeply unhappy.

  Well, he won't have to bear it much longer, she thought. Aloud: "I am in continuous contact with our lord Darkist," she said soothingly. "All changes in plan are made with him fully in mind." It was best not to lie directly to a magician, even if you were shielded. "The battle served both our purposes, disposing of the inconvenient. And Darkist's land forces have not been weakened at all. Merely destroying warships would leave an invasion of the coastlands of the New Empire very difficult .If the army is lost under the walls of An Tiram, everything up to the North Shield Wall will fall in a year. Darkist will rule, and we as satraps under him."

  The priest nodded grudgingly. Willek went on: "And you know the peril our foreseeings found. The battle seems to have disposed of it."

  "The Sea Mare is gone," the priest said. Willek smiled slightly, and the man's face contorted. "Not destroyed, you—gone. I cannot find it. It is not even in the power of Kevo, which a sunken ship would be. Simply gone from all sight and scrying."

  Willek blinked, feeling her smirk turn gelid. I cannot turn my plans aside from fear alone, she thought. That might itself be the thing that brought disaster on her.

  "Well, find them, then," she snarled. "Go!"

  "I hope there aren't too many more like him," Brigadier Multin said, stroking his beard.

  Willek spread her hands. "I don't think so. It's difficult to keep hereditary enthusiasm all that warm through centuries of danger without reward Are your troops ready?"

  "As ever," the brigadier said cheerfully. "My Shillraki mercenaries and Krevaulti levies really don't much care whose backside warms the throne. Neither do the Tykissian regiments I've had under me on the western border—Shemro's ah, loss of touch— over the past decade has eaten away a good deal of her popularity. Late pay, bad rations, that sort of thing. We'll start the acclamation, and the rest of the army will join in before they know what's happening. Win big, hand out the donatives and plunder, and you'll be the most popular emperor since the founding."

  They exchanged a thin smile. I'll definitely have to do something about him, Willek thought He wouldn't stay bought.

  Shoddo nodded judiciously. "I'm sure the civil service will welcome a new regime." Pelkar nodded in his turn; they both had the sleek air of Olmyan city nobility.

  "It's in the hands of the gods, then," Pelkar said.

  That, Willek thought later as she sat alone in the admiral's cabin, is what I'm afraid of.

  Darkist luxuriated in the deep silky folds of his couch-robe and opened his mouth so one of his nubile young dancers could feed him another tiny strip of sugar-cured keri. When she leaned over, he tugged on her nipple-bells and listened to her squeal and laughed quietly as she darted just out of his reach.

  To the victor go the spoils, he thought happily. The Tykissian navy, its power broken, lay at anchor in the harbor in Cnit The wall in the Quiet Room showed him the twisting, dark streets of cities throughout the dead Tykissian empire, where news of his victory spread, and people danced around bonfires in the village squares, rejoicing at the downfall of the hated Shemro. His own navy at that moment sailed toward home, triumphant—he would greet his ships personally as they cruised between the giant legs of the statue of himself that acted as gate and guard to Tarin Tseld s greatest harbor.

  The One of a Thousand Faces had found his sacrifices good and granted him the triumph he deserved. "I bought this battle with the coin of blood," he told the concubine who knelt at his feet, awaiting his merest whim. "It is the only coin gods respect."

  She kept her eyes down, as was proper, but Darkist noted her shudder and smiled. She did well to fear him. A hundred of her sisters had gone beneath the knife, along with the senior lord of every household Darkist suspected of havening treason; the sacrifices had ceased only when Darkist read the footprints of magic in the entrails of a prince of the realm and saw the omens of Tarin Tseld's defeat change before his eyes to a crushing defeat for his enemy, Willek.

  And the instant after that, the bothersome tampering of several hidden wizards had ceased as well. The dread certainty of pending disaster which had gnawed at his guts for days was gone.

  His troops would require perhaps two weeks, and possibly a few days beyond that, to make necessary repairs and resupply; then they would sail to the Tykissian empire and claim their prize.

  He considered his grandson, out in the garden chasing and futtering concubines like the young ram he was, and Darkist's smile grew broader. First the prize of empire—and then the greater prize.

  "Enough," he told the slaves. He could not sport with his women all day; he had much to do. The greatest burden of work fell on the winner of a war.

  He rose slowly and slapped the dancer on her bare buttocks in passing. The greater prize…

  He would send an energy creature to devour Willek, he decided. Something that would feed on fear and grow huge on its way to her so that when it reached her it would be unstoppable.

  He headed for the Quiet Room.

  Karah slogged through scum-specked knee-deep water toward the neck of high ground. Overhead, sharp-beaks and fearegulls wheeled; Karah suspected each of the little clumps of birds on the ground of harboring one of the Sea Mare's dead. The low mournful wails of the big black sharp-beaks; the shrill cries of the gulls; the steady slosh of waves around her legs as the tide went out—all of those were sounds of a land unwanted by humans. A place far from help, Karah thought.

  She had never seen such a desolate place; endless pebble-strewn flats and tidal pools that, perhaps, parted company with the sea somewhere off in the blue haze in the distance. The sun beat down on Karah's head and the glare reflected off the water into her eyes. Scrubby bushes struggled for existence on the little rocky islands of higher ground. Barrels and bits of planking and timber floated in the pools or were strewn across the sand and rock. Wet gravel shifted underfoot.

  She staggered out of the water to the next high spot with Bren leaning on her for support. He was feverish and coughed constantly.

  "You're beautiful," he whispered. "I love you with all my heart and soul."r />
  "You're sick," she said calmly. "So I won't hold any of this against you." The sicker the First Captain had gotten, the more he'd adored her. The last hour or so, while they were still clinging to their wreckage and before they'd floated within reach of land, he'd asked for her hand in marriage, tried to undress himself, tried to undress her, and recited a surprising amount of passionate poetry in between coughs.

  He was so terribly sincere, and his body felt so marvelous pressed against hers—she found herself wishing it was him instead of his fever talking.

  They walked to the highest point of the piece of land they were on. It was sparsely covered with scrub-brush—the whole place was overwhelmingly flat, but this little rise was high enough and had enough live plants on it that Karah felt sure it would be above the water during a normal high tide. The shrubs would give Bren some shade. She was afraid if he walked much farther in the heat, he would die. Karah found the heat and glare and the biting of uncounted tiny insects nearly unbearable.

  "Wait for me," she said. "Right here. I'm going to see if I can find anyone to help us." She also hoped to find at least two of the horses, and supplies washed ashore from the ship—and she had less pleasant things to attend to, as well. She had to find water and perhaps a febrifuge. Those she was most likely to find still attached to the bodies of the crew.

  Bren wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into a fervent embrace. "Make love with me," he said.

  She struggled out of his grip. Even sick, he was extraordinarily strong. His fever-bright eyes looked at her with longing, his cracked lips parted, waiting her kiss.

  She still thought he was pretty—and she would have bet he looked better out of clothes than in them. "Godsall, I wish I knew how much of this you were going to remember later," she muttered. But she pulled away. If he were still inclined to randiness when he was in his right mind, she thought she'd take him up on any offer he might make. But this—