by Larry Niven
“Heaven preserve us! Demon fire!” the captain screamed. Then he called out: “Trim the sails! All passengers below deck!”
“What is happening?” Tahlia asked.
From the beginning of their voyage, Captain Dinos had been a fatherly figure. Now in this moment of trial he seemed to grow taller, even more protective. Tahlia was afraid for him, but also proud and reassured. “Whatever magic they use, they’ve not used it against us, Princess. I think they want you.”
I think they want you.
The words reverberated in her head. Their meaning sank in more deeply. As she was pulled to her cabin, the ship lurched up and plunged down again, and at the apex she glimpsed one of the small ships, close enough now to make out the human shapes swarming the deck.
The pirate craft continued to belch fire. Then one of them exploded, like a pinecone in a bonfire, amid screams of dismay from its crew.
“Come on!” Drasilljah said, and hauled her into the cabin. Her nurse barricaded the door, and they sank back into the shadows, arms around each other.
Terrible things were happening above-decks. She heard shouts and then the shrill call of steel on steel. The Proud Abyss was being boarded. Screams and shouted orders. Captain Dinos’s voice above the howling wind.
Then another scream, low with agony and wet against the rain. The captain’s voice was stilled.
A pause, and then a banging at her door. “Open the door, Princess.” The voice was like stone. “Open the door, and we swear you will come to no harm.”
Drasilljah held her tight. No.
“Open the door. We know your nursemaid is with you. If you force us to break the door open, we’ll kill her. If you open it yourself and offer no resistance, I promise no harm will come to her.”
She looked at Drasilljah for guidance, and her nurse shook her head. No.
Tahlia thought frantically. This was nightmare. Whatever happened next, she knew those men could break down the door and take her. If there was any chance that Drasilljah could survive this, she would have to take it.
“I’ll open the door,” she said. Drasilljah pulled at her, silently begging, but Tahlia held her at arm’s distance, suddenly transformed into the older of the two. “Whatever happens next,” she said. “If I am to survive it, I will need you at my side.”
The tears streamed from the old woman’s eyes. It was not concern for herself that caused them; it was fear for her charge. Shame that she could not protect the girl she loved. Gratitude that that girl would think of her nursemaid before herself.
Tahlia opened the door, then shrank back.
The man at the door was the largest human being the princess had ever seen, a full head taller than the captain of her mother’s guard. Part troll, perhaps. She had heard of such obscenities.
It snorted, its flat broad nostrils blowing hot air and wet drops at her, but she didn’t flinch. It seized the meat of her upper arm like a wrestler grabbing a baby, and pulled her out onto the deck.
The man waiting there was smaller but more dangerous. He was broad and thick but moved with an odd fluidity, like a palace dancer. A sense of coiled, leashed potential. This was the power. This man. He was the one to deal with.
There was something else. Captain Dinos sprawled dead, curled on his side like a child. He had died protecting them.
But Chastain, the first mate, the man whose eyes she had felt crawling upon her from the first day … Chastain was alive. More than alive, Chastain stood at the side of the man she now assumed was the leader.
So, a traitor. She felt Drasilljah tense, heard a whispered curse.
“Not now,” Tahlia whispered, and was relieved to feel Drasilljah relax away from the edge of the precipice.
“You are in charge here,” she said to the leader. Not a question, a statement.
“Yes, I am,” he said.
“Who are you?”
His smile was, considering the circumstances, rather kindly. “I hope you understand that the less you know of me, the more you can hope to eventually be returned to your mother safely.”
She weighed his words. This man was not discourteous; he spoke well, with the enunciation of one who spent a great deal of time at some court, layered over a rougher tone. A military man, totally confident in his skills. Someone who had lived hard and fought his way to power. A man who lived by his guts. And yet … something about the delicacy of his phrasing, the excellent bones of his face suggested nobility. Perhaps even royalty.
Who was this man? Could his word be trusted?
She threw the dice. “I have your word that if I come with you without resistance, you will protect my life and that of my attendant?”
“Yes, you do,” he said.
“There is one thing I must do before I leave this ship. Have I your permission?”
“We have not long, princess,” he said.
“This will only take a moment.”
He nodded agreement.
“Now,” Tahlia whispered.
No one could have moved fast enough to stop what happened next. Drasilljah’s hair comb was fashioned as a carved shell, but actually of painted steel, its edge as hard as metal and as sharp as broken glass. She whipped it across Chastain’s throat so fast he hadn’t even a chance to blink. His eyes opened wide, and he fell, gagging and clutching at the wound.
Tahlia held her breath. The next moment would tell the tale.
The leader watched Chastain die on the deck, his heels drumming against the wet.
He turned to Drasilljah and plucked the comb from her hand. “Nicely done,” he said. “I loathe traitors.”
SIX
Bad News
Even before the guard arrived at his door, summoning him to the palace, Neoloth-Pteor knew that there was something terribly wrong. All night his sleep had been restless, filled with images of shadow creatures with bloody teeth.
His had been a shallow repose, a transparent state partway between ordinary sleep and wakefulness. “Wizard’s Sleep” it was called, more efficient and effective than ordinary sleep, and one of the secrets of his power.
The knock at his door roused him in waves, thinning the line between sleep and wakefulness. “Sorcerer! You are needed!”
He rolled up, planted his feet on the floor, and stared at the wall. Neoloth could feel disaster looming, like a storm cloud crouching below the horizon, invisible but oppressive. It pressed against his head like a squeezing fist. The guards barely waited for him to dress himself, and they took him along the more direct corridor aboveground.
Climbing the hill gave them sufficient elevation to hear and see for miles. Lights twinkled down there. A dog barked sharply. Voices drifted on the wind. Something was wrong, and word of it was spreading.
The guards ushered him into the crown chamber. It seemed that the entire castle was awake. The queen sat rigidly upon her throne. Her eyes were red-rimmed, as if she had already been crying for hours. The smaller throne to her right, her daughter’s throne, had never looked so empty.
Neoloth bowed deeply. “My queen,” he said. “How may I serve you?”
“Conceal yourself in the private chamber,” she said, voice urgent and strained. “Watch what occurs in the next hour. Advise me.”
For the first time since he had been employed in Quillia, he reached out and took her hand. It was cool, and dry, and too thin, as if the substance between skin and bone were wasting away. She did not seem to consider his action a transgression and did not pull away from him.
“Go,” she said, indicating a heavy red curtain behind the throne. He stepped quickly to conceal himself behind it, and found himself in a chamber just large enough for a single chair. A section of the curtain at face level was thinned enough for a man who pressed his face against it to see the throne room while remaining unseen to supplicants approaching the queen.
Neoloth waited.
The door at the far end of the outer chamber opened. Three men were ushered in. They were tall and sun-darkened. Th
ey had spent time in the desert.
Mercenary sorcerers who would sell their arts to the highest bidder. One of them glanced directly at Neoloth’s hiding place, as if he could see through the curtain. Then he looked away.
“Oh Great Queen. We bear greetings from the ruler of Shrike.”
Yes. The kingdom north of Nandia, Princess Tahlia’s destination. A closed kingdom ruled by a despot. They traded goods, of course, but only with the most stringent of oversight, and their citizens traveled abroad less frequently than those of any of the Eight Kingdoms.
Further, rumor had it that families never traveled together, wives and children acting as hostages against betrayal.
This was very, very bad indeed.
“Welcome to my kingdom, great ambassadors,” the queen said. Her voice was so strong and regal. It was possible that only a liar as accomplished as Neoloth himself could have detected the tremor therein. “Upon your return, convey greetings to your great king. Tell me how I may serve you.”
“We come seeking no service, Great Queen,” the tallest of them said. “Rather, we seek to offer service.”
“Service?” Her puzzlement seemed real.
“Yes. One of our trading vessels, bound for the southern kingdoms, encountered flotsam from one of your sailing ships, with sailors clinging to broken wood. Obeying the code of the sea, we rescued them and, upon hearing their tale and provenance, wish only to return them to safety.”
“While I appreciate the rescue of our brave sailing men, I do not yet understand why my advisors considered this an emergency requiring my immediate personal attention.”
“Your Royal Majesty. Upon interviewing the rescued sailors, we learned a fact that disturbed us deeply. A fact it would have been remiss not to bring to Your Majesty’s attention. Those rescued claimed to have been sailors aboard three of Your Majesty’s ships. They tell us that the flagship, the Proud Abyss, carried the royal daughter. Would these be considered facts?”
Neoloth could not see the queen’s face, but he could visualize its sudden tightness. “Yes, it is true.”
How it must have pained her to say this. What strength it required to keep the strain from her voice, Neoloth could only imagine. What he did know was that he was witnessing magic of a very different variety.
“Your Majesty, it is our sad duty to recount their tale.”
“Or rather,” said a shorter man, “allow the sailor to tell his own tale.”
He clapped his hands again, and the door opened. Two small, dark Shriker types dragged in a man on a canvas travois. He looked dead but for a fitful, wet snore. A seventh man, face pale and clothes torn, shuffled into the room as if his feet were shackled.
“Oh mighty Queen,” the man said, and he was shaking, afraid to meet her eyes.
“Rise,” she said, as kindly as possible—again, Neoloth wondered where she found the strength. “Tell me what happened. Omit nothing.”
“I’m Sanam. This is Glarios, but he cannot speak. He’s been sleeping since they fished him out of the sea…” He told of an uneventful voyage, ending with, “We were returning from the wedding,” he said, “and there was a storm.”
“Your ship foundered in the storm?”
“No, Your Majesty. Our sailors were up to the mark. But in the midst of the storm, strange vessels appeared…”
And here the man’s tale turned strange. Out of the storm came small fire-breathing vessels that attacked the three royal sailing ships. They carried no flags. No masts. Fire and thunder erupted in the midst of the rain. Sanam’s ship, the Domino, groaned and sank in a chaos of shattered wood and screaming sailors. The next thing he knew, he was being plucked out of the sea by a ship flying under Shrike’s flag. And there remained no trace of the Proud Abyss.
The queen cleared her throat. Her angular face had darkened, as if choking on her urge to scream curses and accusations at the man cowering before her. “Do you know what happened to the Abyss?”
“No, your majesty,” he said, unable to meet her eyes. “Four were pulled out. Only me and Glarios are still alive.”
“These … fires and explosions. Did you see such eruptions aboard the Abyss?”
The sailor hung his head in anguish. Such misery made it obvious to Neoloth that he was telling the truth as he saw it. On the other hand, there was something about the three men who had brought him. They were not sailors. Nor were they the usual ambassadors. Or soldiers. No. They were magic users of some kind, but they were either weak (no great surprise, in these milk-water days) or so powerful they could effectively shield themselves, even from the concealed Neoloth.
“No, Your Grace.”
She nodded. “Is there anything else you wish to say?”
His eyes shifted. “No, Your Grace.” Later, perhaps.
She nodded. “Please take these brave men to the healers, and to food and rest. I’ll find a wizard as well and will come to you later.” The sailors were led away, leaving the other three in the middle of the throne room.
For a long time no motion disturbed the room. The air was still. Silence reigned, as if the humans within, royals, nobles, advisors, and guards, were engaged in a test of wills to see who could longest refrain from speech.
“Have you more to tell me?” the queen asked. “Is there no word at all of my daughter? Has the ocean swallowed her entirely?”
“I do not believe that is the case,” the tallest of the three ambassadors said. “We believe that these strange burning ships that throw fire are the same vessels who have attacked our own fleet. We seek them, but confess to surprise that they travel so far south. We seek them north of our own borders. We have agents among the Northfolk, and believe that, given time, we can learn what has happened.”
“What is your belief?”
“I believe that the princess is alive and held by these men. They have raided ships before, seeking slaves, women, loot. While ruthless to men, they are not known to slaughter women. Rather, they hold them for ransom … or…” He paused significantly. “Keep them for themselves, if you understand the implications. We believe that we can find her, if she is where and with whom we believe her to be.”
“The royal personage would appreciate any assistance you can offer. We will, of course, make our own inquiries.”
“The sea leaves few traces, Your Majesty. We were fortunate to find witnesses at all.”
That was certainly true. But better that these sailors had been swallowed by the waves if the smallest portion of their story proved untrue.
The tall man paused again. The silence thickened. This time, one of the queen’s advisors seemed to recognize her distress and spoke in her stead. “We appreciate your return of our sailors. And any efforts you can make to recover our beloved princess. What can we offer you as a token of appreciation for your efforts?”
There it was. To maintain the pretense, the ambassadors could not ask for blackmail. It had to be offered.
The man bowed. “We wish only to continue making safe passage through your waters. That you allow us to conduct investigations and pursue our financial affairs as we see fit. In exchange, I believe we can promise that we will find and return the princess.”
Neoloth reeled. The implied threat was more brazen than he would have believed.
There was more said, but after a relatively short exchange, the ambassadors retired from the room.
* * *
The next day was a whirlwind. Sanam the sailor was allowed to eat but not sleep. He was drilled endlessly on everything he had seen and heard. He said he had been treated well by the Shrikes. He bore no sign of coercion or magical control. Again and again he told the same story: A storm. Small steaming ships coming out of the night. Explosions. Sinking. Those steaming ships swarmed the Abyss instead of trying to take her down.
And that was the only consolation any of them had.
At midnight, the queen summoned Neoloth back to the throne room. “Great Mage,” she said. An edge of desperation had crept into her voice.
“What words of wisdom have you to offer?”
“This is like no magic I’ve ever heard of,” Neoloth said, “and I thought I knew of every form of magic.”
“My daughter?”
“It was a veiled threat, of course,” he said. “They captured the princess and wish you not to interfere in their affairs.”
“For what purpose?”
“I do not know,” he replied honestly. “What I can say is that the very need to control us suggests that the princess yet lives. I would expect that in a moon or so, they will present a letter written by your daughter and supposedly smuggled out. It will contain information only she would know and will calm you.”
He could see that she wanted terribly to believe what he was saying but was no fool. “And their ultimate purpose?”
“War, perhaps. They wish to be certain that you do not side with another kingdom against them.”
“And they kidnapped Tahlia for this purpose. What can we do?”
“They perceive you as weak. They doubt you will launch an attack against them. After all, they merely returned two of your sailors and offered assistance. It would be difficult to get another of the kingdoms to stand with us on such meager evidence.”
Despite her trappings of power, she seemed … diminished. Desperate. “Can you use your arts to find her? If so, your reward would be great.”
A thought seemed to occur to her suddenly, and she raised her voice. “Send out the call,” she said to an advisor. “To the princes who sought the hand of Tahlia in marriage. The royal or noble personage who returns my daughter to me wins my approval, and rich reward. He will wed her and inherit my kingdom. Send the word.”
And so it was sent.
SEVEN
Wizard at Work
Reinforced by the talisman’s powers, Neoloth-Pteor’s scrying pool swirled, foaming into images of storm and sea so realistic they threatened to soak the room. He saw what the sailor saw, as the man had surrendered his mind to Neoloth’s spells.
It was truth. All was as the wretched sailor had testified.
Vessels with neither mast nor sail, pouring smoke. Explosions like lightning striking dry trees but in the midst of the storm. Drowning, gripping something as it banged against him, clinging, fainting.