by Ellyn, Court
~~~~
Laniel received the summons twenty days after returning to the Wood. He raced to Linndun expecting the worst, for Lyrienn’s message had been vague at best. It read only, ‘Come home now.’ Was he to put urgent emphasis on ‘now’ or not?
In the parlor of the avedrin’s suite, he found his sister in hushed conversation with Aerdria. They looked puzzled but not mournful.
“… all day?” the Lady asked. She must have only just arrived herself.
Lyrienn nodded. “Since before dawn. I don’t understand it, and he’s not felt inclined to explain anything to me.” She saw her brother in the corridor and reached for him, smiling.
“You had me worried,” he said, receiving her kiss on his cheek. “He’s all right?”
She glanced at the door to the bedchamber. “He’s … better.”
Laniel examined her face for bruises. “He wasn’t too rough on you, then.”
She exchanged a peculiar expression with Aerdria. There was a tale behind it, but Laniel decided he was better off not knowing the details. “Will he see me?”
“I think he’s been waiting for you.” Lyrienn opened the chamber door for him. Kieryn sat upon the hearth rug, his feet tucked under him, his chin lifted, his hair pulled neatly back from his face. A new blue robe fanned out behind him. The onyx ring on his right hand glowed a terrible black fire, and above his open palm a tongue of blue flame flicked and danced.
Bewildered, Laniel looked to his sister. “All day,” she whispered. He approached his friend cautiously, but Kieryn’s face was utterly serene. He even smiled when he noticed Laniel’s arrival. “I took some convincing, didn’t I?” he said. The blue flame burned steadily.
Laniel laughed, all his worry dissipating like mist. “Kieryn, you’re the most stubborn duinovë I’ve ever—”
“Dathiel,” he said quietly.
“Say again?”
“I am Dathiel. Thorn.”
~~~~
Part Five:
INTERLUDE
53
Shadryk bellowed and tossed a letter opener like one of his daggers. The emerald-studded falcon’s head quivered from the upholstery of his council chair. Hands curled into claws, he shouted, “Goddess curse that fucking idiot!” The curses echoed back at him from the corners of the council chamber, mocking his tantrum. The next time Goryth rode through Brynduvh’s gates … ah, Shadryk would tear open the fool’s chest and rip out his heart.
Cross the Bryna into Leania? What had that crack-toothed whoreson been thinking? Was he so eager to fight that he couldn’t wait until the floodwaters receded?
“Tsk, tsk,” he heard. Shadryk turned and found his sister standing at the far end of the council table reading Bano’en’s declaration of war.
“I ordered everyone out, Ki’eva!”
“So you could throw a fit, yes, I heard,” she replied dryly, “and so has everyone else.” She looked resplendent in ivory brocade, with a strand of pearls at the base of her throat. Setting aside the letter, she crossed her arms and asked, “You’ll replace him, won’t you?”
“Replace Goryth as warlord? Are you mad? With whom?”
“Lord Jast, anyone.”
“Jast is good at running down children and chickens, but he’s not a strategist, Ki’eva.”
She advanced like a storm. “Your precious pet may have just cost you the war, brother. And Westervael.”
“I’ll have your mouth sewn shut.”
Ki’eva’s eyebrow jumped. “But not have Goryth replaced? You wound me.” She sounded anything but wounded.
“A simple coup,” Shadryk said, “that’s all this was supposed to be. No war at all. At least, not on our side.”
“No, brother. War was inevitable. Did you honestly think that once Rhorek was dead, the Aralorris would let you just traipse in and settle affairs for them?”
No, he hadn’t, but he didn’t feel up to telling Ki’eva she was right and that his fit was unwarranted and childish. He poured himself a drink instead. The wine service in the middle of the council table was reserved for toasting business that he deemed concluded, but the wine and the service were his and he wanted a drink, damn it. A feeling of powerlessness spread through him like a fever, alien and ugly.
Ki’eva laid a hand to his forearm before he could gulp down the wine, took the glass, and sipped. After a moment, she handed it back to him. “Don’t let your anger make you careless, king. All is not lost.”
Her willingness to sacrifice her life for him drained the fight out of him. He touched her face, and she kissed his fingers. Not all the news he’d received was bad: Goryth had reported that Tírandon crumbled, broken and burned, and that his army was safely ensconced inside Bramoran. Zhiani troops marched to Lunélion and Ilswythe with Dragons full of bile. Perhaps those strongholds burned already. What did it matter if Leania marched against Fiera? They would come too late. Goryth would subdue Aralorr, and send Shadryk the golden crown from Rhorek’s brow. Shadryk’s first order of business? Send a regiment of his reserves from Quelstorn to Stonebrydge, to secure the Great Ford. He would expand Westervael to include Leania as well. The only suitable justice for her interference.
Leania’s land army was not the force that posed the greatest threat, but her navy was another matter. “Ki’eva, send for my scribe. I must dictate a letter to Lords Quelstorn and Brydger. Then prepare. We leave in the morning for Gildancove.”
~~~~
Admiral Madon had secured his position eight years before, when Shadryk ordered his patrol ships to arrest and search the merchenters that crossed Galdan Bay and toll them for all goods that did not come from Fiera. The Leanians had taken exception to this statute and began loosing their ballistae as soon as they spotted the Fieran patrol. Several battles had been fought in the waters surrounding the Tempest Peninsula, that dangerous hook of jagged rock that snagged many a ship. The Tempest Conflict, as it came to be known, lasted a full summer before Shadryk agreed to toll the merchanters for only foreign wine and timber that crossed his waters. At last Bano’en decided to “buy the man’s bloody trees and brew,” bringing the conflict to an end.
When Admiral Korrman’s ship burned and sank near the opening of the hostilities, Commodore Madon sailed in with banners flying, winning the day and the commission as the new admiral of Shadryk’s navy. Over the course of the summer, he earned a reputation among the Leanians as the elusive Shadow of the Seas. His tactics were unpredictable, his whereabouts kept secret. One never knew where the man might turn up.
On the other hand, Madon wore a flask on his hip, and his face was often red from drink as much as from sun. Shadryk arrived at the admiral’s headquarters and found the Shadow of the Seas slouched in a stained leather armchair before a smoking hearth. The untidy parlor was cluttered with charts and instruments, stacks of books and trays of half-eaten food. The place reeked of liquor and unwashed sailor. The view, however, was spectacular. Shadryk threw open a window and breathed in the fresh sea wind. Galdan Bay stretched out under the sunset. To the south, the wide yellow waters of the Galda River fanned out and were lost in the black sea. The piers that clung to the quay were nearly empty. Merchant barges had been moved upriver while most of the fishing boats lay belly up on the docks or in the sand like massive sleeping tortoises. A dozen tattered shells of once-proud warships bobbed in the surf, resembling the rotten skeletons of sea serpents, their masts burned and broken: the result of Evaronna’s arrival in the Bay, and all that appeared to remain of Fiera’s navy.
Ruse.
The ships that survived the attack had been repaired and deployed to keep the blockade from sailing too close to shore. Shadryk could see them on the horizon, wide sails burnished in the failing light. The rest of his warships, however, had been secreted away upriver. According to Madon, it was safe to bet that neither Bano’en nor the Evaronnan duke knew how great a force awaited its chance to come out and play. Was Madon’s word trustworthy?
The leather chair creaked as Madon
stirred. He smacked his mouth, dry with drink, and scrubbed a hand over his face. His aid had warned Shadryk of the state in which he’d find the admiral, but he hadn’t realized it would be this bad. Madon reached for his flask, sloshed it and groaned when he found it empty. A bottle of white wine winked from the side table; he swiped it up as if it were just another whore in a long line.
Shadryk cleared his throat, and the bottle stopped halfway to Madon’s mouth. Realizing who his guest was, he scrambled to rise, but his legs were full of liquor; he fell hard into the chair again. “Pardon, sire, for my condition. When I’m on land, it’s the only way I can see straight.”
Shadryk sprang upon him, slapped the bottle from his hand. The glass shattered on the hearth; the wine drowned out the last of the puny fire. “Sober up! We’re on the brink of disaster. One of my generals has jeopardized everything. I won’t have you fail me, too, because you prefer a bottle to a woman’s tit.”
Madon was too drunk to feel fear or shame. Perhaps he wouldn’t feel them even if he were sober. “My king’s wine is beyond compare,” he said with a wistful grin. His fingers scratched deep inside his beard, dug out a louse, and flicked it toward the hearth.
“You’re a disgrace,” Shadryk said, backing away. “Who is seeing to your job, Admiral? Your aid seems a competent fellow.”
“That twit? He does nothing without my say so. Can’t make up his mind which is larboard and which is starboard otherwise.” He grimaced and scratched his crotch. Somehow this unkempt drunk had managed to distract the Evaronnan blockade enough to see that Shadryk’s mercenaries kept arriving. Only four Zhiani ships had been found and sunk with all their valuable cargo, and for each one lost, three had slipped safely into port to deliver fifty or more Zhiani warriors and their Dragons.
“What’s the trouble, sire?”
Would he even remember, if Shadryk told him? “Bano’en decided to take sides. He chose the wrong one, which means your job just got more complicated. Perform it drunk, and I’ll replace you with the twit before you can drain another bottle. Got it?”
Madon saluted. “Aye, sir. First order of business?”
“What else? Attack Leania’s fleet before it deploys, if you’re not too late already.”
“Sire,” he sighed, dragging himself out of the chair, “it’s not as easy as that. One, you’re right, Bano’en’s fleet may already be on its way.”
“I saved you a couple of days by coming to you instead of sending for you.”
Madon positioned an enameled pot on the floor between his feet, unlaced his drawers and pondered while he pissed. “Two, before I can attack any Leanian port, I may have to destroy half of Evaronna’s fleet. Have you seen how many ships Beryr has out there? And the Evaronnan navy ain’t alone. Apparently that Aralorri chicken hawk has no qualms about hiring pirates. My sailors have counted three brigs.” The man held up four fingers. “Two are fresh off the building docks, and rumor has it the duke’s building a hundred more. Sire, those brigs sail circles around our galleons. I gotta contend with them before I can deal with Leanians.”
Shadryk was not impressed with the whining or the excuses. “The Shadow of the Seas can’t chart a way past them? The Leanian ships at Graynor are your goal, Admiral. Destroy as many as you can or find yourself peeling potatoes in a merchanter’s galley.
Madon had no riposte for that.
“You have two days to sail. The moons are good, and your twit of an aid has sent my order for the galleons upriver to be made ready. We cannot afford failure, Admiral.”
Two days later, the White Falcon and his sister stood on the balcony of their seaside palace watching twenty Fieran war galleons drift silently between the reedy banks of the Galda. The Goddess was with them, for that night, a solid blanket of gray clouds rolled over the moons, and Shadryk’s fleet slipped past the blockade on an outgoing tide.
~~~~
The salty sea spray misted Athna’s cheek. The seas rolled rough and the wind pummeled hard off the Tempest coast, but the skies were clear as the Pirate’s Bane hurtled into Galdan Bay with a cold northern in her sails. In all the esteemed history of Leania’s navy, only one other woman had commanded one of the king’s ships. With forty-five years of service, a glass eye, and half a left hand, Captain Esmerilla of Gethmar was more smuggler and pirate herself than captain of a respectable warship. Still, Athna admired the crusty old sailor for earning the respect of her crew and being able to keep it. It had taken Athna months before the men assigned to her ship stopped warding themselves against bad luck when she came up on deck. Some still refused to look her direction; others looked like they might enjoy catching her alone. She never left her cabin unarmed and often wore her cutlass to bed. The men eventually learned she was no one to trifle with and that it was her word that kept the ship moving and the grog flowing. Some few among the officers, however, still preferred to receive their orders through the first or second mates. The sailing master, in particular, was a pain in the arse. He stood at the wheel gamming merrily with the first mate, but as soon as Athna climbed to the quarterdeck, he went all stony and said not another word.
Wyllan greeted her warmly, however, with a tip of his feathered hat. “No sightings yet, Cap’n.” Though the first mate was only in his thirties, the flesh of his face and neck seemed too big for his bones, and sun and wind had faded the red of his hair and freckled even his lips and eyelids.
“Acceptable,” Athna replied. “No reason to expect sight of the blockade so soon.”
“Aye, we’ll have a hell of a time finding the admiral in all this. At least the weather’s holding.” Galdan Bay was poorly named; it was damn near a sea in its own right. Locating one ship in this vast expanse wouldn’t be as simple as finding a leaf floating on a pond, after all. Neither was Wyllan mistaken about the weather. Rain had plagued them across Brynlea Bay, but it cleared, ironically, as soon as they rounded Tempest Rock.
From high in the masthead a sailor called, “Ship, Cap’n! Evaronnan.” The sailor’s arm pointed out over the portside bow.
“Wyllan, bring us alongside,” Athna said. He repeated the order to the boatswain and the crew.
“Have the peace flag raised under the king’s banner.”
Wyllan saw it done.
The Evaronnan galleon drifted into view. Dark red banners flapped from the shrouds, and her hull sat low in the water, heavy with armaments and supplies for a long siege of the Fieran coast. The Bane’s flag officer laid out the brightly colored flags and had them raised in the proper order, relaying Athna’s wish to approach. After some moments, the Evaronnan officer flashed an acceptance flag, inviting the Bane closer for a gam. Sails rustled as men hauled them in, and the Bane slowed to a crawl. Athna soon saw that the ballistae along the starboard side of the Evaronnan ship were armed and trained on her galleon. Too easy for enemy ships to disguise themselves in friendly colors. With only forty yards between the two vessels, Wyllan cupped his hands and shouted, “Where do we find Admiral Beryr? We must deliver a message to Admiral Beryr.”
An officer aboard the other ship called, “Have we Bano’en’s friendship?”
“Not only that, but his alliance,” Wyllan replied.
The Evaronnan crew whistled and cheered, and the officer jabbed his arm south. “We passed Beryr’s flagship only this morning. Anchored five leagues on.”
“Good enough,” Athna muttered. The two ships said their farewells. The Bane let down her sails again and hurried on. Initially, Athna had been flattered to be singled out and sent on an errand, but after leaving Graynor, she found herself hoping her Uncle Bano’en hadn’t sent her south to keep her safe from any engagement he might have planned for the rest of his fleet.
Not long before sunset, the man on watch announced a second Evaronnan vessel. There was no mistaking Admiral Beryr’s flagship. The long heavy sunlight flared off tiers of gold paint and a seamaid clutching a fistful of silver arrows. The Diamond Arrow boasted not one ballista deck, but two.
Once
the flagship accepted the Bane’s approach, Athna called across the darkening water, “I seek permission to come aboard.”
The officer replied, “No women on deck. Where’s your captain?”
Athna grit her teeth. “I am the captain. King Bano’en is my uncle. He sends me with words from his own hand.”
A man in a large black hat topped with dark red feathers approached the officer, and the officer called, “Permission granted.”
Athna crawled into a jolly boat with six oarsmen. They scudded across the billows into the flagship’s shadow, and Athna climbed the ladder lowered for her. The admiral himself stood on hand to greet her, the feather in his hat as dark as blood in the failing light. “Forgive my men, Captain,” he said. “They are … traditional … in their superstitions. You must be Athna, a lady of Wyramor.”
“Yes, sir. I’m honored.”
“And I’m curious. We’ll talk in my cabin.” While Beryr read Bano’en’s letter, he stroked his wiry cheek whiskers. Athna sat stiffly at his table, the high collar of her blue coat hot and tight. She hadn’t expected the bout of nerves that came with treating with so exalted a seaman. Beryr was regal, formal, and comfortable in his command. Everything Athna longed to be. “Astonishing,” he said at last, setting the parchment on the table. “Pleased I am to sail the seas with you, Captain. I admit, your navy is unmatched, as are your Hellbenders, and Galdan Bay is large.”
“Thank you, Admiral,” she replied. “Though may I be forthright, sir, and say that neither myself nor the rest of the Leanian fleet are pleased to be sailing alongside pirates?”
Beryr had a grand, easy laugh. “I’ll be as forthright and say I was none too happy about it either. But you may be misinformed. Only one of our ships is actually manned by pirates. The other brigs are legitimate naval vessels—though designed by a pirate. I can assure you, Captain Rehaan has proven himself trustworthy, and, though I hesitate to go so far as to call him honorable, he is certainly the boldest of Evaronna’s navy. Duke Harac may be ill, but he was not mistaken in his judgment of the man.”