As Gale neared, Locke gestured for him to stop. Gale gave a cruel smile and took an extra step. They were a mere ten paces apart. Locke bore the dirty, uncultured coral structures of an Ungale spread over his skin. He had a bag at his feet.
Gale looked over Locke. He spoke in disgust. “It has been long years since I have taken a meeting with an Ungale.”
“I know,” Locke said. “You honor me. I am your humble servant.” He gave a small bow without lowering his eyes.
Gale spat. “You are anything but humble. You have sought my chair. You have organized against me. You have challenged the rule of House Gale.”
“I never sought your chair. You closed your ears to all but the poison of one. Before that one’s poison, we lived in relative peace. But he needed that to be the case no longer. He needed secrets kept these long years. So he pushed you to drive us out. To drive me away. To free him to dangle you like a fish on a hook.”
Gale darkened. “We shall see who dangles,” he said, glowering at Locke.
Locke continued. “It took me countless moons to understand what had happened. To understand why Odell drove a wedge into the Sunken and why you remained in place. To understand what truly happened on the night of the dark deal. Finally, I realized Odell’s great lie. He told you it was not a kidnapping. He told you it was an exchange. And that is why you have sat on your hands, doing little for the past few years.”
Gale said nothing, but his hand tightened on the hook.
“It is your son. You wait for him.”
Gale’s eyes snapped up to meet Locke’s. Thoughts of his son had rarely been far from his mind these past years, though to express them would be a sign of weakness.
“You believe your son to be in the Court of the Queen of Camron, while you hold her daughter. You believe he has been there for three years. You believe there approaches a meeting between you and the Queen, where the mutual hostages are returned. You believe the three years has been arranged to solidify an alliance, wherein your son will be wed to one of the Queen’s daughters.”
Locke looked down, apologetically. “None of this is true, my Lord. Odell knew exactly what story to feed you. I can only assume he told you that House Gale was remembered above, that the Queen feared your power so greatly she wished the exchange. That she needs an ally against the other noble houses and you would be that ally when the hostage period expired. He would have told you that she wished it to be secret. That the alliance would go public when your son and her daughter would be wed. Again, none of this is true.”
Gale scratched the hook against the coral walls. The scraping sound echoed through the Hall of Whispers. He did it again, frustrated to realize he was buying time to think on what Locke was saying. That he had been betrayed by his closest servant. “So many lies. If you speak the truth, why would Odell tell me this?”
“To buy himself time. He saw your restlessness. He knew you were ready to rise. He wanted that stalled.”
“Why? Our rise would only grow Odell’s powers.”
“Are you aware of the return of dragons? The game has changed.”
“Where is my son? If the match was a lie, where is my son?”
Locke stood still for such a long time Gale nearly asked again. Then Locke leaned down and opened the bag at his feet. He removed a polished, white skull from it.
“You lie,” Gale spat out.
“I will leave this. You can examine it. Pieces of his darkine are in there, some intact. You will recognize them.”
“And learn you killed my son? You and your people will suffer. I will hunt down every last one. I will turn the Plate over in my wrath.”
“I have no doubt about your wrath, but you point it in the wrong direction. To what end would I have killed my rightful Lord’s only heir? Odell killed your son.”
“I do not believe you.”
“When was the last time you saw your son?”
Lord Gale remembered grasping his son’s darkine, Grinwell Gale VIII, giving it one last look before pushing him away from the throne. Telling him to learn the ways of the updwellers but not forget he was a Gale. And watching him leave the throne room with Odell just behind him, a swell of pride in his chest. Three long years ago. Grinwell, who had swum and hunted with the best of them. Who had slain his first thresher at eight years old. Lord Gale had shaped that curl on his darkine himself, and when he caressed his son’s back, it was to that point his fingers were most often drawn.
“You could have taken him.”
“Without Odell knowing? And without telling you we held your heir? We knew nothing of that side of the exchange. That lie was whispered in your ear by Odell and heard by no one else. The setter of traps. We knew your son was gone from under the Plate. And I watched Odell take the princess and bring her to your court. But we did not know where your son was. Then the war renewed and the Ungale were forced to flee or die by your hook. So we fled. I kept my people alive, not in defiance to you, but in defiance to the liar who held your ear and filled it with rot. I knew not then he had killed your son, or I would have brought that straight to you.
“Tracking Odell’s movements became our highest priority. We needed to discover what had led to the resurgence of hostilities between Gale and Ungale and believed he was at the center. So we followed him. It cost many lives. He captured and tortured many Ungale. I do not know if he told you of them or not. I do not know what stories he created to keep the war alive.”
Gale thought back to the reports of raids on Gale stores, the dead Ungale dragged in front of him by Odell and his growing group of loyalists. If even a part of this was true, how many Sunken would pledge their loyalty to Odell before Gale? Something which had been unthinkable moments before was suddenly real. His House had been divided on his watch.
“Then one night six moons ago, we saw Odell take a path he’d never taken before. A long journey to the easternmost edge of the Plate, where the land begins. There is a cave there. He entered and emerged an hour later. When he was out of sight, we went in. We found the bones of your son. We left them undisturbed for a time, uncertain if what we were seeing was true. If such a betrayal of House Gale could be possible. When we learned of the raids above the Plate, we knew Odell was leading you into another trap. He arranged the raids, yes? To what end? What did he tell you?”
Gale said, “That before the final exchange, House Gale needed to demonstrate its power. That the Queen would benefit from having her enemies fear our new alliance.” He felt shame creeping over him, how easily he had believed the lies. Or was Locke leading him down a different treachery? “That we would need wealth once we had surfaced and the ransoms would provide that.”
“But Odell never requested any ransoms. He doesn’t care about wealth.”
“What does he want?” Gale felt a powerful hatred growing in him. His memories of caressing Odell’s darkine, speaking with pride of him to the updweller. Now he recognized how quickly Odell had moved to quell that conversation. And how quickly Gale had appeased him, ordering the updweller hung. The squirming he’d done when Locke’s name had been brought up. Odell had feared Gale would learn of this.
“He wants dragons,” Locke replied. “He has seen their power. He covets it. And he has formed alliances with great evils to learn more. The raids have not been for ransoms. The raids have been conducted with one target and one target alone.”
“What target?”
“We intercepted a note just yesterday. There is a man above who controls a dragon army. He is the key to Odell’s plans. Odell believes his capture and death will shift the loyalty of his dragons. Then Odell will leave the Plate with his loyal Sunken, on the backs of dragons. With the time of the promised exchange ending, Odell needed to move quickly. You were growing restless, my Lord, and would wait no longer for your son.” Locke looked down at the skull he held in his hand.
“That is not my son.” Lord Gale could feel that he did not believe the words even as they left his mouth. He found he was scrapin
g the walls again. Imagining Locke dangling from a hook. Imagining Odell dangling next to him. Both begging for forgiveness. His son Grinwell watching and learning how a Gale wields power. “Why bring this to me? What do you want?”
“I want a return to the way things were. I wish only to serve again. All the Ungale do. Odell has severed our link to our rightful lord.”
“You lie with great ease.”
Locke carefully placed the bag on the tunnel floor in front of him, then turned his back on Gale. “Now is not the time for us to discuss the future,” he said quietly. “News of our meeting will leak. Odell has eyes everywhere. Once he learns we have spoken, he will no longer hide his ambitions in the shadows. The moon will be full tonight. We both must protect our people. Gather your son’s bones. Think on them. I will be here, ever your loyal servant, waiting on you.” With that, Locke turned and left the Hall of Whispers, leaving Lord Gale alone in the long chamber, but for the bones of his only son.
…
Hours later, Lord Gale was back on his throne. The hooks nearest him dangled with known sympathizers of Odell. Odell’s spies in his court. Gale had placed orders for the capture of Odell, but the Sunken had vacated his chambers. Many of Odell’s most loyal servants had vanished, either wise to the change in tides or seeking some other end. Gale was not such a fool as to trust Locke. But no longer would he be fool enough to trust Odell. Or suffer his betrayal.
He lifted up the skull Locke had given him and looked at it. Gale had confirmed it was his son’s. The pieces of the broken darkine which had accompanied it verified it. He had even found the small curl Gale had shaped himself. That he would keep. The skull was no object of sentiment. It smelled of betrayal and deception. Of lies whispered and believed. Traps set and sprung.
With no heir in place, he had no one to pass his birthright to. Gale’s House would die with him. His people were divided, dead, or afraid. The turning of the tides, the grinding of the coral, the gnawing hunger of the threshers. None of these had broken them. It had been the ambition of a single betrayer among them that had torn them asunder. And the foolishness of the one who believed him and lost his only son for it.
Lord Gale stood and descended from the throne. He walked over to a pair of hooks. On one, a bare human skull hung. It was white, picked clean by scavengers but not yet greened by the passage of time under the Plate. He held his son’s skull up, considering it for a moment. He placed it on the hook next to the human’s. So similar, one could confuse them. At their core, they were the same. This prison had changed the Sunken, weathered them cruelly. Only the will of the Gale House had kept them alive thus far. Reminded them that despite their exile to this hell, they were no less deserving than the creatures that dwelled above them under an open sky. This dominion had grown stale, like the air in an old and tired chamber. Gale’s dreams of rising had been held in check far too long. It was time to rise. Tonight. His weakness had been exploited. But Gale had endured and survived for decades that which would break those atop the Plate in hours. It was time for them to kneel. Or hang from his hook.
But first he needed to take care of something. “Bring me the princess,” he said, without turning from the hooks holding the two skulls.
He felt rather than heard her behind him. She had mastered the art of silence. Gale had paid her little mind during the long years, believing it beneath him to speak to a child, even one of royal blood. The others had not known how to deal with her so her time had been spent in quiet contemplation. When Gale had noticed her, she was often looking upwards, as though pondering an escape from this prison.
“Princess Kylee Olmont of Camron,” Gale said, his only words spoken directly to her during her three years of captivity, “I would introduce you to Grinwell Gale VIII, my son. He was to have been your husband. Yours or your sister’s.” He gestured to the skull.
The princess remained quiet. Gale turned and looked at her, feeling her tremble under his gaze.
They were interrupted by the return of a group of Gale’s guards, one of Odell’s loyalists held between them. He was battered, near unconscious. Lord Gale looked at him a moment, then turned back to the hooks. He removed his son’s skull and tossed it to the side. “Let him hang here,” he said.
…
Locke surfaced in the chamber nearest his gate. Fennet and Cornett were playing cards. Locke joined them at the table and was dealt into a hand. He sighed as he received a high card and began looking around for his fishnet bag.
“And?” Cornett prompted, looking at Locke.
Locke drew out a wooden cup and placed it on the table. He poured the last of the wine they’d won from the SDC spy, which Locke had later won the balance of from Cornett. He drank it and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Gale will try to take the Plate. And he must fail. Send the messenger.”
Chapter 28. The Messenger
Jenner was on break, so he used his time to stand quietly in his room, staring up at the wooden beam he intended to use to hang himself later. It ran the length of his small space, high and sturdy, unblemished. He would anchor a rope to his bed, a heavy, blocky structure that had no doubt served countless guards before him. He could get some rope from the supply master. He should have done so already. He’d jump from the end of the bed. The important thing was breaking the neck. If he faltered and let his feet reach for the ground, it might not snap cleanly. Perhaps he could tie his feet together? Shameful he was still working through the details on this, the night of the full moon.
Jenner didn’t value the break in his shift. He’d prefer to use the time prowling, making final preparations for tonight’s shift. The most important evening shift in three years. But he’d learned the other men wanted time away from him, time away from his intense scrutiny. The stink of his failure. The damaged eye of Watchful to remind them of the cost of losing the faith of the pack.
He wasn’t happy with the shift assignments. He understood why he was given a low priority post, but he would have liked to see different pairings throughout the grounds. There was too much putting of friends with friends, with the idea of making the passage of time in the long nights easier. That simply invited slack. Jenner would have placed rivals together, the better to keep each other diligent and prepared, eager to be the one to first identify when something unwelcome entered the halls through whatever means of access they had. Some of the men still harbored doubts about the existence of the Sunken. He would have moved those off-site. They could guard the walls, guard the treasury, guard anything but the Queen’s daughter.
He decided he’d given the wooden beam enough contemplation for the moment and stepped out into the hall, where he saw a fresh set of wet footprints on the stones of the hallway. The image was so jarring, for a moment he was convinced he was only seeing them in his mind. The guilt had finally driven him mad. Maybe his price of failure was to see wet footprints in front of him every time he walked these halls. Even as the thought came to him, he shook his head softly. He hadn’t seen them before. This was new.
He knelt down and touched them, feeling the water on his fingers. Was this another ruse, like the one Trey and Brooks had pulled? Or the real thing? Either way, it needed investigating. Jenner straightened and drew his sword.
The hallway was quiet aside from the pounding rains outside. Jenner followed the trail, which led around a corner and into the Great Dining Hall. The Hall was unlit, though a faint light streamed in from the few narrow windows high above the tables. There was a single figure seated at a long table, a bottle of wine and a glass in front of it. Even from across the dim room, Jenner could see it was a Sunken.
He leaned back into the hallway and banged on the wall in the pattern that summoned all nearby guards. The first to arrive was given the signal to collect the others. In short order he had ten Queen’s Guards by his side. He entered the Hall, resisting a small swell of satisfaction at the thought that any guards who had laughed at his belief in the Sunken would shortly be shown their error.
Jenner gestured to the guards to spread out around the Sunken. He pointed two back towards the trail. “Follow that and see where he came from. Make sure he is alone.”
“I am alone,” the Sunken said in a quiet, low tone. He drank again. As Jenner watched him closely, he could see how aged he was. The foreigners had described viral warriors. This was not that. This was an old man, trembling and tired.
There was a long silence, Jenner not quite sure how to proceed. Finally the Sunken spoke again. “Once, when I was young, a ship lost barrels of wine over its side. We were able to gather those which did not break. We found a large chamber and opened them there. It was a good time. A rare, good time. I haven’t tasted wine since.” He turned and looked at Jenner. “One who was with us could still read. He said the barrel was labeled Porcenne. Is this wine from Porcenne?”
“Why are you here?”
The Sunken said nothing, merely looking at Jenner. Jenner said, “No. It’s a local blend. Or from Tannes. But not Porcenne.”
The Sunken gave a deep, tired sigh. “I do not remember the taste so well. I thought I would. But I had forgotten. I could not tell you if it was like the wine I once had.” He pushed back his chair and slowly rose to his feet. The guards behind Jenner tensed.
Alliance of the Sunken (Spies of Dragon and Chalk Book 3) Page 19