Spy's Honor

by Amy Raby

“Tens of thousands,” said Jan-Torres. “All of your family members survived this invasion. Do you know how many of my family members survived your uncle’s invasion of Mosar?”

  She shook her head.

  “One,” he growled. “My brother, Kal-Torres. My parents are dead. My aunts and uncles, dead. My cousins, dead.” His eyes grew hard and his tone more heated. “My anger is not directed at you. You didn’t ask for it to happen, and you were not there. You did not see the horrors that were inflicted on my country, and this very minor invasion is your first taste of war. Of course you find it horrifying; you place a high value on every human life, a trait I admire in you. You have no basis for comparison; you’ve lived a sheltered life here in the palace, away from the realities of war. But I do have that basis for comparison, and I tell you that we have exercised remarkable restraint, and I will not be shamed for what I have done here.”

  Rhianne let her breath out carefully. She had never seen Janto angry before. He was an entirely different man now that he’d assumed his true identity, and he was a little bit frightening. “What are your intentions?”

  “My intentions . . .” He frowned. “They depend on a few things that will happen over the next few days. But no matter what happens, I can assure you that no harm will come to you.”

  “Will you let me go?” It had occurred to her that Jan-Torres and his men might flee the palace before the reinforcements arrived, and if they did, they might take hostages. She would be a prime candidate.

  He hesitated. “I can’t answer that yet.”

  She looked away. This was a nightmare. She’d saved this man’s life twice, once from Florian and again from Augustan. He’d saved her life too, but he had no right to lock her up and set guards over her. “What about Morgan, the man from the infirmary? Has he had his surgery?”

  Jan-Torres’s eyes narrowed. “Who is that man and how do you know him?”

  “First tell me if he lives!” Rhianne protested.

  “I’ll send a runner to find out.” Jan-Torres rose and went to the door. He conferred with someone and returned to his seat. “We’ll have word shortly. How do you know him? He fired on my soldiers in the city of Riat—nearly killed someone.”

  “Please forgive him; he was drunk. Morgan is former Legaciatti, forced into early retirement when a Riorcan assassin wounded and disabled him. Florian denied him his pension for failing to kill the assassin. And those pensions are supposed to be guaranteed.”

  “Your uncle is a sapskull,” said Jan-Torres, “if you’ll pardon my saying so. If Morgan is disabled and without a pension, how does he support himself?”

  “I supply the pension,” said Rhianne. “Lucien and I have been privately pooling our funds, and I’ve been delivering them by sneaking out through the hypocaust.”

  Jan-Torres’s gaze softened. “I should stop marveling at how many acts of kindness I stumble upon here that have your fingerprints on them.”

  Rhianne looked down at her lap. His words warmed her heart, but they did not change the fact that this man was now her jailer. She had loved the gentle language scholar she’d met in the Imperial Garden, and she’d continued to love him when she’d learned he was a spy collecting information to aid his people. But now he was the king of Mosar and the commander of an invading army. She had loved Janto. She was not sure she could love Jan-Torres.

  The door opened, and Jan-Torres went to speak to his runner. “Good news,” he called from the door. “Morgan survived the surgery. He’s conscious but weak. It will take him some time to recover.”

  Rhianne leapt to her feet. “Can he be brought here, to my rooms? I could care for him while his strength returns. It would give me something to do, and I wouldn’t be so lonely.”

  Jan-Torres’s forehead wrinkled.

  “Stop being jealous,” she scolded. “You’ve no right to be. And you know better than anyone that Morgan has never been my lover.”

  He shifted uncomfortably. “I’ll make the arrangements.”

  35

  The much-awaited message from the sentries arrived two days later: the Kjallan fleet had been sighted in the Neruna Strait. Janto’s stomach knotted. Here was the moment of truth. Now he would find out whether the plans he’d set in motion would save his country or destroy it.

  Signals flew wildly between the palace, the cliffs, and Kal’s fleet in the harbor, as the Mosari and Sardossians made their final preparations.

  Janto had commandeered the suite of a high-ranking Kjallan official as his personal quarters. It was on the third floor, with a large marble balcony overlooking the city and the harbor. From the balcony, he watched the mastheads of the Kjallan vanguard as the ships glided closer. “Rosso,” he called to his door guard. “Fetch Emperor Lucien.”

  He’d made arrangements for some of the high-ranking Kjallan prisoners to watch the fleet action from balconies and windows in the palace. Seeing it in person would have a bigger impact on them than hearing about it secondhand.

  The young emperor arrived on his crutch and false leg, escorted by six guards. Janto beckoned him onto the balcony; the guards waited outside.

  Lucien limped toward him. “Now we find out if you were bluffing about that reserve fleet.”

  “What reserve fleet?” Janto smiled and held out a bottle of Opimian Valley red. “Wine, Your Imperial Majesty?”

  Lucien stared at the bottle. “You stole that from the imperial wine cellars.”

  Janto popped the cork. “I compliment you on its quality. My men have been enjoying it very much.”

  Lucien gave him a sour look.

  Janto poured the dark vintage into twin crystal glasses and handed one to Lucien. “Your ships are forming up.”

  The first seven ships had maneuvered themselves into a line and were sailing into the harbor single file, skirting the western edge of the harbor, moving into a position that would allow them to engage Kal’s fleet.

  “Wait,” said Lucien. “What happened to the shore batteries?”

  Janto gazed at the sad heaps of crumbled stone. “We blew them up.”

  “But why? You control them—they give you an advantage!”

  “They were complicating things.”

  Lucien’s eyes narrowed. “You’re up to something.”

  Janto smiled.

  As the first line of ships rounded the edge of the harbor, more ships entered, but in a haphazard fashion. They had seen that the batteries were destroyed, so the only threat to them was Kal’s fleet. The first seven ships would engage Kal’s fleet while the rest sailed in behind them and landed troops.

  Kal’s fleet, waiting deep within the harbor, looked small and pathetic. Gods, Kal, I hope I haven’t signed your death writ. But Kal had positioned his ships well. He’d stationed them as close to the docks as possible, so that no enemy ships could slip around and attack him from the other side. It negated the Kjallans’ advantage of numbers. The Kjallans would have to fight Kal’s six ships with a roughly equal number of their own; there was no room to bring in more.

  Lucien sipped his wine, holding his glass with one hand. With the other, he gripped the balcony railing, his knuckles whitening as the first of the seven ships reached Kal’s fleet.

  The first broadsides went off almost simultaneously, producing great flashes of light followed by a terrible roar. Wood exploded. Sails shuddered, riddled with holes, and a Mosari mast came down. The Kjallan ships sailed along the line of Mosari ships, firing as they went, until they’d lined up one-on-one against Kal’s ships. The extra seventh ship tried, without much success, to place itself so it could rake the last Mosari ship’s stern.

  “Hold them, Kal,” Janto muttered. His own knuckles grew white on the railing.

  Meanwhile, the rest of the Kjallan ships swarmed into the harbor and began dispatching boats full of ground troops. Janto had stationed his own troops, some mounted and some on
foot, around the edge of the harbor to engage the enemy soldiers who landed. But most of them were former slaves, some of whom had only just learned how to fire a pistol. Their numbers were small, and the area they were covering immense. They could hold the Kjallans for a little while, but they could not stop a large-scale landing.

  Kal’s fleet was locked in a deadly melee with the Kjallans. Masts and spars tangled together; sails ripped and flew free. Cannons roared. From this distance, Janto could not tell who had the upper hand.

  When does the battle start? asked Sashi from his shoulder. His whiskers quivered with excitement.

  Janto’s eyebrows rose. It’s going on right this moment.

  Oh. It’s far away. The ferret retreated, disappointed, into Janto’s shirt.

  The first wave of boats hit the shore, where ground troops engaged them. Still more boats were on the way. His forces would soon be overwhelmed.

  Lucien smiled. “Where is that reserve fleet of yours?”

  Janto indicated the point of the harbor, where mountains blocked his view of the sea. The bows of two ships glided into view.

  Lucien inhaled sharply, then blew out his breath in relief as it became apparent they were Kjallan ships flying Kjallan flags. He squinted at them. “Those aren’t enemies. Are they?”

  Janto was silent. More ships appeared in their wake—Sardossian ships this time, but also flying Kjallan flags. The new arrivals looked for all the world like the Kjallan fleet returning from Rhaylet, with Sardossian prizes in tow. The ruse would not hold under close scrutiny—there were too many Sardossian ships compared to the number of Kjallan ones. But in the chaos of battle, it would take time for the Kjallan commanders to work that out, and that time would make all the difference.

  Lucien turned to him with a pained expression. “It looks like our fleet from Rhaylet. But it’s not.”

  “No. More wine?” asked Janto.

  Lucien wordlessly offered his glass.

  By the time the Kjallans realized the new arrivals were not reinforcements but enemies, they were trapped in the harbor. They could not use their advantage of numbers and double up on the new ships in open water, but had to fight them one-on-one from the harbor, where they had no room to maneuver.

  “We still have you outnumbered,” said Lucien.

  Janto clenched his fists. “Come on, Kel-Charan.”

  There it was: the signal. It flew over the palace in exultation, its purples and greens picked up and repeated from one side of the harbor to the other. Orange flashes lit up the eastern and western cliffs. The ships in the middle of the harbor tried chaotically to return fire.

  “What did you do?” cried Lucien. “You took the cannons out of the shore batteries and lined them up along the cliffs?”

  Janto nodded. “We had to lure your entire fleet into the harbor first. And the batteries were too-obvious a target.”

  Soon, the inevitable outcome of the battle became clear. Boxed in by Kal’s fleet on the north, the Sardossians and Riorcans on the south, and the cliffside cannons on the east and west, the Kjallans had no room to maneuver. Many of them couldn’t fire off a clean shot without harming their own ships. One Kjallan ship struck its colors, and then another. Kal’s ships and the cliffside cannons aimed their deadly fire at the boats attempting to land ground troops, sinking many. Janto’s ground forces finished off those that made it to shore.

  The young emperor stared numbly at the ruins of his fleet.

  Janto signaled for the guards and pressed the wine bottle into Lucien’s hands. “Retire now, and think on these events. Tomorrow, you and I and the fleet commanders will discuss the terms of our peace agreement.”

  • • •

  Rhianne’s door opened, and a pair of guards entered. They carried a makeshift sling between them.

  “Morgan!” Rhianne cried.

  “Stand back, miss,” said a guard as she approached.

  She moved away obediently, seeing how they struggled with their burden. She didn’t want her friend to be jostled or bumped. “Place him on the couch there, if you would.”

  The guards carried the sling to the couch and deposited Morgan on it. He looked up at her, ashen faced but alert.

  “A Healer will come by later to check on him and instruct you in his care,” one of guards told her. Then they left.

  “Can I get you anything?” Rhianne asked anxiously. “Food, drink? Uh . . . chamber pot?”

  “I’m fine,” said Morgan. “I can walk short distances, so I won’t be as much trouble as that. And if I’d known I’d be nursed back to health by an imperial princess, I’d take mad potshots at entire armies more often.”

  “Oh, hush.” Rhianne pulled up a chair next to him. “What possessed you to do such a thing?”

  “I’d say it was the wine.”

  “You need to lay off that stuff.”

  “I’ll take it under consideration.”

  She folded her arms. “Are you patronizing me?”

  “Are you mothering me, little girl who’s half my age?”

  “I’m not a girl, and I’m not half your age either.” Rhianne picked up his hand. It was alarmingly cold. “You need another blanket.” She went to the bedroom, fetched one, and tucked it around him. She picked up his hand again—it was enormous compared to her own—and rubbed it between both of hers, trying to warm it. “You really do drink too much. Are you unhappy, Morgan?”

  He moved his shoulders in an approximation of a shrug. “A man’s not made to sit around and listen to the gossip of his neighbors.”

  Rhianne frowned. Morgan wanted to work, but he was crippled and all his skills and training were physical. His right hand didn’t work properly, and he had a hard time raising either of his arms above his head.

  “I’ve been working up the courage to offer myself to that Mosari king,” continued Morgan. “But I can’t imagine he’d want me. I was useless before and more so now I’ve been shot.”

  “The Mosari king? You mean Jan-Torres?”

  “Whatever his name is,” said Morgan.

  “You can’t join his service,” Rhianne protested. “You’d be a traitor!”

  “Hardly,” said Morgan, “when the emperor cast me out first.”

  “You don’t know anything about Jan-Torres,” she said. “He might treat you badly.”

  “Nah,” said Morgan. “I’ve been in wars, spent time in hostile Riorca, and it’s a miracle I didn’t bleed my life away in the streets of Riat that night. Do you know how many military commanders will use their precious Healers to save the lives of enemy soldiers or civilians? None, that’s how many. But the Mosari king did.”

  Rhianne considered this. “Aren’t you furious about him marching in here and taking over?”

  “I don’t give a flying tomtit,” said Morgan. “And anyway, he can’t hold this place; not when the reinforcements arrive. I’m surprised he survived the arrival of the fleet—”

  “The fleet’s returned?”

  “Yes, there was a monster of a battle in the harbor. Didn’t you hear it? I suppose you’re on the wrong side of the palace. Jan-Torres must have won, because his men are still here. But our ground forces are unstoppable. He’s not here to hold Kjall, because that’s impossible. He’s not here for bloodshed, since I’d be dead if he was. So he’s here to cut a deal. He’s got Lucien by the cods—pardon my language—and you can’t blame a man for wanting to save his country.”

  “No,” said Rhianne. “I suppose you can’t.”

  36

  Janto met with Lucien again the next day.

  The young emperor looked up as Janto entered the room. “Have the fleet commanders arrived?”

  “Not yet, Your Imperial Majesty.” Janto grabbed a chair from the far wall, casting a surreptitious glance at Lucien. The young man’s eyes were hard and calculating. He’d recovered from the sh
ock of losing his fleet, it seemed, and moved on to damage control.

  Lucien shrugged. “Every day that passes brings my ground troops from northern and eastern Kjall closer to liberating the palace.”

  “We won’t be waiting much longer for the fleet commanders. They’ve had casualties to attend to, and emergency repairs. Also, the harbor’s a mess; it’s impossible to maneuver in there. I don’t envy the man tasked with cleaning it up.” He smiled.

  Lucien folded his arms and sniffed. “I hope you came here with a better offer than the one you brought before.”

  “Your fleet’s been destroyed, and you think I’ve come with a better offer?” He set the chair in front of Lucien and straddled it. “You’re lucky I’m not making it worse.”

  “I’m not giving up Mosar.”

  Janto shrugged. “For your sake, I’m sorry to hear that, since it will cost you the four warships and three battalions of troops you have stationed there. In a matter of days, the Sardossians, the Riorcans, and my own men will sail to liberate Mosar, and we are fully prepared to fight your outnumbered garrison.”

  Lucien was silent for a moment. “Perhaps an arrangement can be made.”

  “Give me your fleet’s private signal and send with me new orders for your men, commanding them to return home in peace,” said Janto. “Otherwise, I’ll destroy them. My combined army outnumbers your three battalions on Mosar, and you know I’ve got more ships. I’m making this offer for one reason only: I’m tired of bloodshed. I want it to end.”

  Lucien’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.

  Janto sighed. “Let me also point out that without those four warships stationed at Mosar, you have no fleet.”

  “I have other ships.”

  Janto chuckled. “You’re bluffing. Yes, you have more ships—the three that police the Riorcan harbors. Other than that, nothing. And don’t give me any horseshit about putting guns on merchant ships; they’re no match for real warships and you know it. We destroyed your Rhaylet fleet, your Sarpol fleet, and your harbor fleet. If you do not accept my offer—my gift, Lucien—you’ll lose the four ships at Mosar and be left with only the three at Riorca. Which might leave you in some trouble, since Riorca now has ships of its own.”