by Mike Shel
“A rather bold red vintage grown in the fertile vineyards of the central Karnes,” announced the captain, who fancied himself a connoisseur. “The year 751, if I’m not mistaken. Of course, this pales in comparison to what we’ll secure when we visit the Isle of Kenes.”
“What is that, captain?” queried Belech, who had gulped down his own glass as though it was a mug of beer.
“Yes, good sir,” the captain answered. “Remote, storm-wracked Kenes is known for two things: monks, and the grapes they grow. Most are devotees of Chaeres, sweet goddess of the harvest herself. While you five are taking care of your business at the Monastery of St. Qoterine, we’ll be loading crates of the stuff they bottle into our holds. Whites and reds both. Practically worth their weight in gold.”
“Excuse me, sir,” interjected Sira, “but I couldn’t help noticing the votive candles and stone carving on the desk behind you.”
“Ah, my shrine. Yes, the carving is an ancient idol representing Vanic, who is my patron—many captains in Her Majesty’s navy are devotees of the god of war. They were given to me as a gift by a Syraeic swordsman who retrieved them from Maardesh’il’al-Under-the-Mountain, many years ago.”
“A rare gift,” said Gnaeus, apparently appreciating both the veal he was eating and the pedigree of the captain’s timeworn icon.
“Indeed. I must say, it has always puzzled me,” said Hraea, looking over the lip of his goblet. “So much demonic evil skulks in the ruins of the Djao. And yet from it King Coryth the Revelator brought us our blessed gods, who shepherded Hanifax to glory.”
“We also have the Djao to thank for the gift of sorcery,” added Del, an impish smile on her face as she caused her own goblet to float in the air and tilt a sip into her mouth.
Auric shot her a stern look. You push our luck, Del.
“Indeed,” said the captain with a suppressed growl.
Sira attempted an intervention. “Speaking of our blessed gods, Captain, I understand you have no other priests of Belu aboard. May I ask why?”
Hraea opened with a patronizing smile. “Priests of Belu aren’t strictly necessary—no offense intended, gentle Miss Sira. We trust old-fashioned Hanifaxan medicine here. Several men in my crew are quite skilled and I have a dedicated medicus aboard. And after all, the Duke Yaryx is a warship, while Belu is the goddess of peace as much as healing. You see the inherent theological contradiction, of course.”
Sira responded with tight smile and polite nod.
At that moment, the cabin door burst open and a muscular, blond-haired man marched through, attired in a sharp black uniform with a cutlass strapped to his side.
A thoroughly martial fellow, thought Auric.
“Forgive my tardiness, Captain,” said the new arrival in a deep voice. “My duties detained me.”
Captain Hraea raised a glass. “Guests,” he announced, “this is Commandant Mastro, who leads the Yaryx’s lethal contingent of marines.
Both officers and Syraeic guests raised glasses or gave welcoming nods as the imposing man took the empty seat near the end of the table, next to Del. Spying her outlandish tattoos and the opal set in her forehead, the man offered her a puzzled but warm smile, lifting his glass in greeting.
“If I understand our naval history, Captain,” interjected Gnaeus, not allowing the commandant’s arrival to derail the needling avenue he and Del were strolling, “priests of Belu are not at all uncommon on Hanifaxan ships of war, going back nearly to the founding of the kingdom. And wasn’t Admiral Yaryx himself a devotee of Belu?”
“That is a common misconception in the laity, Mr. Valesen,” responded the captain, oblivious to the man’s intent to annoy. “The admiral honored all of the great gods and had a pantheon established in the ship’s forecastle. An effigy of Belu sat with Marcator, Chaeres, Velcan, even Lalu, goddess of love and beauty, hardly martial qualities. But Vanic had the place of prominence.”
“Hear, hear,” said Mastro, raising his goblet.
“What of the sea gods?” asked Lumari with genuine interest. “They’re conspicuously absent from your pantheon.”
“Ah, a frequent question from landlocked souls such as yourself,” replied Hraea with condescension. “You see, Miss…Umari, is it? Most sailors do not believe the sea gods wish them well. True enough, they make sacrifices at their temples when docked in a civilized port. But think of these acts not as devotion so much as paying ransom, for lack of a better term. No sailor carries a pocket idol of Ushunor, Babaloc, or Purraa on his person. Maybe he fondles a charm on a string dedicated to Marcator, with his sacred jurisdiction over storms, but the tangled deities of the deep, no. They are feared, not venerated.”
“It makes sense, Umari,” chided Gnaeus, the captain again ignorant of his disrespect. “Sailors have a natural aversion to drowning, I would think. Perhaps they believe the sea gods gobble up their corpses in the depths.”
“For a fact, the common seaman believes that Babaloc crews his undersea fleet with the drowned dead,” chimed in Hobesson, between bites of potato. “It’s all superstitious drivel, of course. The kind of thing naïve minds entertain.” He punctuated his contempt with a fork twirl.
“Abshaw and Tenic have tattoos of Purraa’s image on their chests,” interjected a tawny-headed junior officer whose name escaped Auric. “Wriggling tentacles and all.”
“I would hardly credit those two with religious sophistication, Larso,” snapped Hobesson. “Both crawled from a Leatham gutter.”
The captain pursed his lips, evidence of displeasure with his first mate’s tone. Commandant Mastro seemed amused with the captain’s moody expression. Auric intervened with a question. “Captain Hraea, what course do we take on our voyage?”
“I prefer to remain at sea, with minimal time spent in ports,” he answered. “I understand your tasks are urgent and I assume you’ll appreciate our making haste. We’ll bypass the Isle of Kelby, pass Brae and Una, and refresh our supplies at Tessy, where we’ll spend the night. From there, we sail straight for lonely Kenes. While I fear no pirates, we’ll avoid the Corsair’s Run so as not to delay our journey contending with damned sea brigands.”
“Ah!” exclaimed Gnaeus. “I am from Tessy! I’d hoped we would dock there. Haven’t been home in years.”
“You have family there?” asked Larso, apparently unfazed by Hobesson’s earlier rebuke.
“Indeed,” he responded, his tone casual. “My father is Earl of Tessy.”
“Well, sir!” cried Hraea, banging a palm on the table that made the tableware clatter. “I had no idea I had an aristocrat at my table!”
“But the earl’s surname is Thennis, not Valesen,” said Larso, unaware of the implication. Del came to the rescue with a further volley of ill-concealed bile.
“Your Excellency, why is it pirates swarm the western Cradle Sea? I would think warlike sea captains such as yourself wouldn’t tolerate lawless ruffians pillaging our waters.”
Hraea forgot all about the bastard at his dinner table, focusing his irritated attention on Del. “Captain is quite sufficient, Miss Ogara, if that is your proper appellation. Perhaps you are ignorant of history. The Royal Navy, though a braver and more effective force than any afloat, has not yet recovered from the Expedition of Discovery. I would think every schoolchild knows the tale.”
“Alas,” answered Del casually, “my deep study of Middle Djao and the mystical arts has left me little time for more mundane subjects. Would you kindly enlighten me?”
His face more scarlet than usual, the captain looked to Hobesson, who spoke in a sour, pedantic tone.
“Fifty-four years ago, our noble empress, Queen Geneviva I—long may she reign— dispatched a full two-thirds of the Royal Navy on a voyage of exploration and conquest by way of the little-explored south. That expedition did not return. During the ensuing years, replenishment of the fleet has not been a royal priority. In h
er wisdom, she has asked us to make do with the ships we have, while we await the…ah, return of the expedition.”
“I do hope they fare well,” an earnest Larso quipped, stirring the potatoes on his plate.
“Vanic’s sweaty balls, man, you are an idiot,” sneered a red-haired junior officer named Couri, rolling his eyes. “You belong below, emptying the bilges with Abshaw and Tenic, your intellectual equals.”
Everyone but Mastro jumped when Captain Hraea slammed his fork-clutching fist on the table. The plates rattled, and a goblet tipped, spilling wine across the white linen tablecloth in a crimson splash. “Mr. Couri, I would ask that you comport yourself like a gentleman in my cabin, with my guests! Perhaps you should supervise maintenance of the bilges for the remainder of our voyage. I suspect you can contemplate your conduct more intently there amongst hard-working Hanifaxan sailors, who are the backbone of this navy!”
Couri, looking as though someone had pulled his pants down in Boudun’s main market, bowed his head, soaking in the reprimand.
“Well, Captain,” said Auric, taking the ire aimed outside his party as a cue, “I want to thank you for a delightful meal. Unfortunately, we cannot stay for dessert. There are matters my companions and I must discuss in our quarters.”
The Syraeic agents stood one by one, setting napkins down on their plates. All officers save the captain stood and bowed formally. Hraea gave a curt nod. “I look forward to your company tomorrow night as well, Sir Auric,” the red-faced man said, looking down at the stain on his table linen.
Auric and his companions shuffled out of the cabin. No one spoke a word until they were halfway to their cabin in the ship’s forecastle.
“Really didn’t need dessert,” commented Belech with a loud belch. “That entertainment was sweet enough for me.”
“Oh, shut up,” said Auric.
11
The Earl’s Son
The next few dinners in the captain’s cabin passed with less contention. Mr. Couri was absent, and Auric’s companions checked their behavior following a far too parental lecture in their cabin. The six of them spent many of the hours that would otherwise be pleasantly idle in consultation, getting a better feel for one another. Gnaeus named three disparate fencing masters of whom he had made a study, and demonstrated a few of the evocations he could place on his blade: bringing a wicked edge to it, heating it until the metal was red hot but still retained its strength, or freezing it so that it was covered with frost and emitted a faint blue light.
Del saw no need for literal demonstrations, explaining that in addition to the spells common to most sorcerers, she was well versed in protective incantations and adept at summoning supernatural aid. She could marshal some offensive spells if pressed, but admitted her skills at such magic wouldn’t measure up to those of a pyromancer or other casters specializing in aggression.
“I also steer clear of all necromancy,” she said with a grimace, massaging her intricately tattooed throat with her four-fingered hand. “I find that form of magic distasteful and dangerous. I knew a few practitioners who were carried off by what they summoned, or who became so consumed with amassing dark power they began dabbling with raising the dead.”
Auric sensed a story there, but let it pass. Belech’s look was one of worry and discomfort.
At first, Lumari’s speech was nearly as unfathomable as Middle Djao, loaded as it was with references to chemical relationships and processes that were completely foreign to the rest of them. It took her a few moments to realize she was baffling her audience, at which point she corrected herself.
“I’m a generalist,” she said. “I’ve put equal effort into all categories of alchemy. I would say, however, that my strength lies in the ability to detect the nature of substances and recognize a compound’s potential. I like to improvise with local ingredients when I can. It keeps things interesting and sometimes yields fruitful surprises.”
“Can you make things explode?” asked Gnaeus, seeking clarification.
“I can make things explode,” she answered flatly.
Belech followed her, simply raising his flanged mace above his freshly shaven head. “I hold Busy Marlu with this end, and I try to hit things on the head with this end.”
Everyone laughed.
“Busy Marlu?” asked Gnaeus.
“I’ve named her,” Belech said with a comical, lofty look on his face, cradling the weapon as though it was a newborn babe.
“Marlu is a rather obscure saint of Belu’s church, once very popular in the western regions of the main isle,” Sira clarified, her crooked smile broad. “Devotees pray to Marlu as an intercessor for headaches and such. I think good Belech means to suggest that his Busy Marlu keeps the saint hopping.”
Auric was heartened by the quick bonds that seemed to be forming between Belech and their four youthful cohorts. He still felt a strange distance himself, due perhaps to the painful sense of personal responsibility for their lives and the burden of the expedition’s ultimate success.
Almost a parental duty, he brooded. Even for Belech, four years my senior. Would playing father to this unlikely family be a source of unexpected difficulties in the trials ahead? And then he thought of waking beneath his bed at the cathedral, of blacking out as his blade cut into Sira’s poisoned leg. When would his phantoms make their presence known again? At what crucial moment?
“What of you, Sira?” asked Lumari, interrupting Auric’s ruminations.
“I’ve a gift for healing,” she answered, making a reverent gesture to her goddess, “and some facility with driving off the dead and keeping evil things at bay.”
“Perhaps you can do something about Gnaeus, then?” joked Del. Gnaeus casually pushed her from her chair.
“I saw you reading a book before dinner,” said Belech as he helped the sorcerer rise from the floor. “Is it a prayer book?”
“No,” said Sira, pulling a small volume from her tunic. The book was bound in satiny pale blue leather. “It’s a tome called Meditations on a Robin’s Eggshell.”
“Sneezing St. Eret,” quipped Gnaeus with a sneer, “that sounds absolutely dreadful.”
“Truth be told,” responded Sira with her crooked smile, “it is a pretentious thing. However, the author is Quintus Valec.”
Auric and the others looked at the cleric with rapt attention. “The same Valec who was part of the first expedition beneath St. Besh?”
“The same.”
“And what have you gleaned from its pages?” asked Lumari.
“That Quintus Valec was a man who thought his wisdom worth disseminating across Belu’s clergy. It was intended for parish priests of the Blessed Mother, to aid them in guiding their congregations. He states—repeatedly, three dozen ways—that a priest’s first duty is to remain blameless, an example of self-sacrifice and internal peace.”
“That doesn’t seem out of sorts, Sira,” said Belech.
“No, it isn’t. But it’s the way he says it. One gets the sense that he thinks himself superior to others, as though he floats above the shortcomings and foibles of the rest of humanity. His piety lacks…humility, or simple empathy for our imperfections.”
“Ah, one of those,” said Gnaeus with a knowing nod. “Fancied himself a living saint or something? I imagine fellows like that having very tight sphincters, eh?” He held up a clenched fist to the cabin.
“Do you now?” quipped Del. “I myself haven’t spent as much time contemplating the sphincters of others. Are you yourself an authority, Gnaeus?”
The group laughed, Gnaeus along with them. But Auric reached across to Sira, who handed him the slim blue volume.
Compared to Boudun’s sprawling harbor, largest and deepest across the Cradle Sea, Tessy’s was a modest, narrow berth, with less than a fifth of rambling Boudun’s capacity. But Tessy was nonetheless an important port city, the final stop for vessels bound
for the Barrowlands or attempting the perilous journey through the Corsair Run to the three coastal cities that clung to life in the teetering Duchy of Kelse. Its wooden towers rose in imitation of the stone spires of Boudun, and its docks were alive with activity. The Duke Yaryx wasn’t the only ship tied at the docks earmarked for the Royal Navy. Two speedy caravels, the Oracle and the Trials of Aelon, were both loading cargo at a furious pace, urgency in the movement of their crews.
It was nearly evening, with the sun setting behind Tessy’s spires. Watching the fading light at the ship’s port railing, Auric overheard two dockworkers aboard the Yaryx bubbling with excitement as they shared their news with slow, sweet Midshipman Larso.
“Captain Lessyr’s Courage is right behind them,” said the taller of the two, “towin’ the Lantern of the West back to port. The four were blockadin’ Albemarr when Bald Pete and the Surly Wench broke out, belchin’ flames and smoke!”
“The pirates have pyromancers with them now?” marveled Larso.
“Unless the pirate lords have managed t’ housebreak fire drakes, I’d say aye!” snorted the short dockworker. “Somethin’ black and growlin’ poked a big hole in the Lantern below her waterline. Aquamancers’ve been holdin’ back the sea for more ‘n four hun’erd miles!”
“Belu’s mercy,” said Larso with a whistle. “We’d be at the bottom of the Cradle if it came to that. How many aquamancers does the Lantern have?”
“Two,” said the short dockworker, coughing a wad of something unnamable onto the deck, to Larso’s dismay. “But Captain Lessyr ordered those from the other three ships t’ board the Lantern and see her back safe to harbor. They’ve been workin’ in bloody shifts!”
Afterward, standing at the railing watching dockworkers and crews of the other navy vessels scurrying like a colony of ants whose mound had been kicked over, Belech asked Auric if he knew what to make of all that talk. “I’ve never been to the west,” he said, standing tall next to Auric. “Don’t know much about its situation.”