"Holy what?"
"Never mind. What are you doing here?"
"I called for him," Marissa said. "And Senosh, and Menkal, and I'm sure he's going to bring Eshira with him as well."
"I thought you said I was only out for a couple of seconds."
Wrong thing to say, he thought, as his comment relit the fire in Marissa's eyes. Her mouth opened, surely to loose another angry torrent, but thankfully she was interrupted by the next wave of intruders.
In minutes, the one-room tent was full. Sal paused long enough to bring Tribean and Gaelen into the fold as well. Once everybody was settled, he gave his account, starting with the Granite Spire, and ending with waking up on the dirt floor.
"Runes! Brilliant!" Jaren exclaimed. "I don't know why we didn't think of it before."
"Because we didn't have any granite runes before," deadpanned Marissa.
"My whittling knife has a small granite chip on it," Menkal offered sheepishly. "Keeps it sharp."
"What?!?"
"I never dreamed that it'd be useful for anything but shaving wood! How was I to know you were looking for some... some... rosary stone?"
"Rosetta stone," Sal corrected. "And it's fine. Don't worry about it. I never would've thought of it anyway until we found those runes in the Spire."
"And how remarkable, that," Jaren cooed, admiring for the millionth time the magazine that Sal had found. "Your soulgem is an amalgamation of our soulgems, so it only makes sense that your runes would be an amalgamation of our runes. But to actually find one, and on something from your world..."
"Really, I don't even know that it is my world that it came from. I mean, we don't have magic -- not like that. And the dates on the wall and the magazine are hundreds of years off from my time. Maybe they time traveled? Maybe time doesn't work the same way here as it did back home?" he offered that last lamely. It really made no sense to him, but it made about as much sense as any other explanation. And he was getting used to the nonsensical.
"The how and why makes for good speculation on mana theory and all," Tribean interjected, crossing his arms as if readying for a dare. "But I'm interested in the what."
"Huh?"
"You touched Granite once. Can you do it again?"
"Oh no you don't," argued Marissa. "You could've killed yourself the first time."
"But I didn't," said Sal. "And if I'm ever going to touch Diamond, I'm gonna need to master Granite."
"But..."
"We're here," Jaren assured her. "He's in the best possible hands. We're not going to let anything happen to him." Tribean voiced his agreement, as did Gaelen and Menkal. Senosh just gave a nod, curt but firm, content to otherwise sit silently on his side of the room and glower Senoshly.
"Walk with me," Eshira said, gently easing Marissa from Sal's side. Well, as gently as the dragon ever did anything. "I've always found gemsmithing to be fascinating. I thought to take it up myself once, since I can't actually wield magic, but artisans tend to live in the bigger cities, and have you ever tried to be a dragon in a city...?"
Sal held his peace until the women disappeared through the tent flap, Eshira "leading" an obviously reluctant but outvoted Marissa. As the flap fell back into place, he cast his eyes, diamond and natural, around the room, taking in his friends one by one. Jaren was absolutely right. If Sal had to take risks with his magic, these were the guys he'd want covering his six.
Taking a deep breath, he sighed forcefully, clapping his hands and rubbing them together far more impatiently than he felt. "Arright. Let's do this..."
* * *
Delana opened her eyes slowly, her vision clouded. A dim light glowed in the distance, swaying back and forth with the rock of the ship. She ground the palms of her hands into her eyes, clearing away the grit. She squinted, willing her eyes to focus. It was a lantern, hanging on a hook in the overhead rafter. It had companions throughout the bunkroom.
Bunkroom...?
She shot up from where she lay on the bunk, casting eyes about.
"Ah, there she is," Harker said, seated at the table in the center of the room. He flicked a card onto one of the growing stacks before him -- Run of Faces, if Delana was right. By the looks of those stacks, he'd been there a while.
"What happened?" she demanded, doubling over slightly as a gnawing pain lanced through her midsection.
"That would be hunger," he noted. "I have a sapphire on my crew that was able to slake your thirst while you slept, but feeding you was a bit more... problematic. I'll send to the galley for some dry rations."
"While I...? You put me to sleep, didn't you!" It wasn't a question.
"I did," he affirmed. Flick, and another card fell on a stack.
"How dare you!" She reached out to Amethyst, but as she grasped it, Harker wielded, and Delana's focus began to slip again.
"Let's not do that now, milady. I could've put a shackle on you a long time ago, but I pride myself in being a more gracious host than that."
"A host doesn't kidnap his guests. Or lie to their guests about being vi'zrith."
Harker nodded slowly, his expression betraying chagrin. "I didn't lie. I just... wasn't completely forthcoming. I had few options and none of them good. I wanted to show you every courtesy, but I had to protect my crew. Putting you to sleep seemed the best way to do both."
"What do you mean, protect your crew? I wasn't a danger to you."
The grizzled sailor chuckled. "Not then, you weren't. But honestly, I don't know you, milady, and I don't know what you're about. This way, I was able to get us far enough out to sea that you can't Lift your way to shore, and you can't kill the crew that would sail you there.
"Why would you think that I would?" she asked incredulously.
Harker stood and crossed the room to her. Slowly, he reached out and lifted the ring that she wore as a pendant around her neck. "Because you have this, and I don't know why."
* * *
Retzu was numb as he approached the guildhouse. It had only been a few days since he'd walked this same walk, bearing an assassin's sword, to declare the death of its owner.
The guard at the door was different, but her reaction was the same as her guildbrother's had been. Without standing on formality, she opened the door and whistled shrilly. Once again, Retzu entered a foyer lined with adherents, standing at attention with eyes forward, forming a hall within a hall, leading up the stairs and to their guildmaster.
As before, they drew their swords as he passed to honor the dead, but this time, a buzz followed him. They knew the significance of the steel-hilted blades. They knew that this wasn't any ordinary death -- as if any death could be said to be "ordinary". They knew Kaleb -- the reputation, if not the man himself.
Greater the grief, if they had.
Time slowed as Retzu entered the guildmaster's chambers. D'prox and Trista stood there, hands on swords, ready to honor the dead as they were when he'd presented them with their daughter's sword.
D'prox's eyes went wide as Retzu drew nearer enough for him to see the manner of hilt the katana bore. Tears brimmed in his sen'sia's eyes as Retzu drew the swords -- first the katana, then the tanto -- and flipped them both in the air to grab them by their respective blades, the razor edges biting into his palms as he presented them to D'prox.
"The shroud is parted, and their eyes see what is beyond."
Retzu studied his master's expression, looking for any sign that the man had known. Rage and grief chased each other across his face. Confusion was there as well, as was total bankruptcy.
He was as devastated as Retzu was. More so. There was no way he could've known.
"How...?" he asked, his voice breaking as grief moved him to break convention. Tears flowed freely down a face of chiseled stone. His eyes burned with barely reined fury. "Who?"
He'd loved his daughter as every father does, but he knew the life that they'd chosen would lead her to her death. He'd accepted it. He'd had to, as his daughter's guildmaster. Retzu knew this. Kaleb, though..
.
"I don't know, sen'sia," Retzu said softly. "I was hoping you could tell me."
"I... I didn't..." Trista stammered, her face twisted hideously with guilt. Her hand shook as she dropped it to her side.
"What?" D'prox turned to her in disbelief. "What do you know? Out with it, woman!"
Her mouth moved wordlessly as she screwed up her resolve. "Fila," she finally said. "I wanted to save her..."
"Fila...?"
"I knew that she was a Shadow Mager. I found out when I was looking into Maxus," she said. As she spoke, her voice grew in strength and her words came faster, as if the floodgates of her soul opened with the initial confession. "I knew about Maxus and Fila. I'm her mother -- how could I not know? But when he went missing, Fila didn't take it as I thought she might. She wasn't angry, or worried, or anything. She acted as if nothing had changed. That's when I found her talking into a sapphire necklace that Maxus had given her. She was still talking to him."
She swallowed hard, then continued. "When Maxus sent us his windings, I confronted Fila about it. She wouldn't say anything. I knew that she'd go to meet him, so I waited, and followed her when she went out. I..." Her voice cracked as her tears renewed. "I found them, south of town. They were there with a granite... and Kaleb... I was too far away. I tried to kill the granite, but Fila blocked my shuriken. The granite turned on me... I woke up some time later. Kaleb was dead, his swords were gone, and Maxus and the granite were nowhere to be found. It was just me and Fila."
"You knew?" D'prox hissed, his whisper seething with contempt. "This whole time, you knew, and you said nothing?"
"I couldn't give her up to you," Trista said, lifting her chin defiantly. "I had to save her."
"But you didn't," he spat at her, jabbing a finger at Retzu, still standing there with Kaleb's swords extended before him, blood congealing on the blades. "The same man who brings me my brother's swords, brought me Fila's. It didn't have to be so."
With the accusation finally aired, D'prox deflated visibly, the anger at his wife's betrayal replaced with the grief of it. "You tried to save her by letting her run from her sins. We could have saved her, together, by making her face them. I am guildmaster, but I am -- I was -- also her father."
D'prox turned to Retzu, and gripped the proffered tanto just below his sodu's hand. "Death approaches," he said direly. Taking the hilt in his free hand, he slid the tanto into a runner that he had hanging from his belt, the blood of sodu and sen'sia smearing across his breeches as he guided the blade home.
Then he took the katana, ceremonially slicing his other hand before gripping it by the hilt. "For this one, he has come and gone. Crafter's bosom or the Abyss, their contract has come due," he said, turning back to his wife and holding Kaleb's sword at the ready.
Retzu could barely breathe as he watched the scene play out. He was utterly torn, not wanting his guildmaster to dishonor the Fellowship by letting Trista's crime go unpunished, but loathe to see his master's wife bear the consequences of an impossible choice.
As torn as he was, he couldn't imagine how much more devastating this was to D'prox, who bore the honor of the guild, and to his wife, who bore his heart. The pair wore a veritable stew of expressions -- anger, betrayal, and grave duty on D'prox's face, guilt, sorrow, and surrender on Trista's.
Wordlessly, Trista dropped to both knees and bowed her head, offering her neck, and holding her hands out to her sides in acceptance of whatever judgment her guildmaster felt necessary.
The tip of Kaleb's katana wavered slightly as D'prox battled within himself. If she were anyone else, her head would already have been rolling. She had willingly covered Fila's guilt in the death of not only a shol'tuk brother, but one who bore one of the three sacred hilts -- the Hidden Triad.
But she was his wife, commanding of an honor that was just as inviolate as the honor of the guild.
The guildmaster couldn't let her live, but D'prox couldn't let her die.
Suddenly, D'prox loosed a shout that was as broken as he was. The blade whistled as it cut the air, blood flying in spatters as steel met flesh. Body parts fell to the floor with a squishy sound, with keenly parted hair following more slowly.
"Kaleb Listau, son of Tikat. Spoken in the light, having met his death with honor," D'prox groaned, visibly spent.
Trista shook with pain and shame, but to her credit, she did not cry out. Her shoulders looked decidedly bare, lacking her accustomed ponytail. Blood spurted from the stumps that her thumbs once occupied, but she didn't move.
D'prox crossed to the firepit and pulled out a brand, crackling with heat. "Death is silent, like the steel blade in the hands of the assassin," he intoned, touching the coal to one stump, the flesh sizzling as it cauterized. Trista breathed in sharply, but did not scream.
"Death is undeniable, like the titanium bit that moves the dragon to his master's bidding," D'prox said, searing the other wound.
Retzu was stunned. To recite the hilt of the fallen was uncommon, but not unheard of. But to recite one's own hilt...
"You have lost your honor, Trista Brightblade, but I give you your life to find it again. You will hold no blade. You will wear no hair clip. You will recite no hilts. To do so would name you Freeblade, and your life would be forfeit." D'prox recited this deliberately, urgently, as if pleading with Trista to take his words to heart.
Finally, he took a knee before her, placed his still-bleeding hands on her shoulders. He drew close to her, his tone taking a note both grave and gentle. "The debt is paid," he assured, holding her in his gaze. "No longer may you bring the Crafter's justice, but may you strive to bring the Crafter's peace."
* * *
Delana leaned on the figurehead out over the banister to watch the prow churn the wave crests into foam. Occasionally, a bottlenose would breach the waves ahead of the ship, their slick skin glittering with unaccustomed brilliance.
It had always fascinated her, how a ship could run over them without hurting them. She knew that the water was not solid, of course, but to see it from above, it could give that impression. Over was still over, and under was still under, and the dolphin still seemed to go under the ship as it passed, only to reappear a bit further down the ship's path, ready to get run over again.
She still didn't know what to make of Harker's... "ploy" was the only word that seemed to fit. She could see some of the logic behind it. When he'd released her from her quarters, she Lifted high above the ship to see what she could see, but it was just as Harker had said -- no land in any direction. Higher and higher she Lifted, even to the point where the air started to thin, but there wasn't the barest speck as far as she could see, nor even the Maw's eternal storm clouds. They were quite literally in the middle of nowhere. She couldn't escape if she wanted to, and to kill the crew -- if she were of a mind to -- would be to kill herself.
Beyond the apparent imprisonment, she had free run of the ship. She was allowed into any crew quarter, storage locker, compartment, and privy, and the crew were all quick with a smile and a word. She was treated as every bit the guest that Harker said she was. They were certainly the most neighborly captors she could've imagined.
But she still had no idea why the "ploy" had even been necessary. The crew didn't know, and Harker was less than forthcoming, saying only that they'd discuss it over dinner that evening. As the sun dipped closer to the horizon, turning the white sparkles in the foam golden, Delana found herself growing anxious, eager to put an end to the mystery.
Finally, the bosun's pipe gave its shrill cry, announcing the evening meal. The galley had no mess hall attached to it, so the crew rotate to the galley in shifts, collecting their rations -- fish, rice, and some dried fruit -- and returning to their duty stations to eat. Delana wended her way through the press of hungry crewmen, finally making it to the captain's quarters, where Harker greeted her cheerfully. He pulled out a chair, running on tracks bolted to the floor, and invited her to sit.
Certainly the most neighborly captor ever.
A crewman entered the room with a cursory knock, bearing a tray full of tin bowls and mugs. He regarded Delana with his sapphire eyes, nodding after a moment, before serving from the tray.
"Katka'ran, my first mate," Harker said by way of introduction. "I've asked him to join us. To provide witness, you see," he added somewhat cryptically.
Delana chuckled in disbelief. "A witness?"
"Of course," Harker insisted, his emerald eyes blazing their sincerity. "For my protection and yours. He's a terrible liar."
"But why would we need a witness?"
"Ah, I see." He offered a private smile, as if at some secret joke. "Allow me to explain. May I?" he asked, indicating her ring. Reluctantly, she slipped the leather thong from around her neck and gave it to the ship captain.
"This is what's known as a bauble," he said, holding the ring before him. "Vi'zrith are not known for their jewelry, save those of pearl or bone, so this is considered rather gaudy. To gift it to someone implies great affection. And the craftsmanship if this one is almost legendary."
"But it's just a plain ring," she countered. "What's so special about it?"
"Well, this one was fashioned for someone of great importance, and bears a number of their familial marks. You really have to be vi'zrith to appreciate its beauty. Allow me..." he said, reaching across the table to touch Delana's temple. She felt the chill of emerald magic course through her as Harker wielded. Releasing her, he presented the ring once again... but it wasn't the same ring.
Delana corrected herself. It was the same ring. It had all the same lines and edges that she'd spent years memorizing. But now she could see it in much greater detail, capturing glittering runes that had escaped her notice before. "How...?"
"A temporary spell," he dismissed with a wave. "It'll fade in a moment, and the ring will appear as it always has."
"So the ring is an artifact," she breathed, admiring it as if it were brand new. And it was, after a fashion. "What does it do?"
Fractures (Facets of Reality Book 2) Page 31