“You may wish to grab hold of something. The storm will soon arrive.”
She looked to the west. A storm? She hummed to Craving again.
“Ask,” Rine said to Command.
“I can easily see the strength of the grand assault force we’ve gathered. But … why do we need such? Are not the Fused enough of an army themselves?”
“Cowardice?” he asked to Derision. “You do not wish to fight?”
“I simply seek to understand.”
Rine changed to a new rhythm, one she rarely heard. The Rhythm of Withdrawal—one of the only new rhythms that had a calm tone. “The strongest and most skilled of our number have yet to awaken—but even if we were all awake, we would not fight this war alone. This world will not be ours; we fight to give it to you, our descendants. When it is won, our vengeance taken and our homeland secured at long last, we will sleep. Finally.”
He then pointed at the cabin. “Go prepare. We will sail swiftly, with Odium’s own storm to guide us.”
As if in agreement with his words, red lightning flashed on the western horizon.
Rysn was bored.
Once she’d walked to the farthest reaches of Roshar, trading with the isolationist Shin. Once she’d sailed with her babsk to Icewater and cut a deal with pirates. Once she’d climbed Reshi greatshells, which were as large as towns.
Now she kept Queen Fen’s ledgers.
It was a good job, with an office in the Thaylen Gemstone Reserve. Vstim—her former babsk—had traded favors to get her the job. Her apprenticeship finished, she was a free woman. No longer a student. Now a master.
Of boredom.
She sat in her chair, doodling at the edges of a Liaforan word puzzle. Rysn could balance while sitting, though she couldn’t feel her legs and embarrassingly couldn’t control certain bodily functions. She had to rely upon her porters to move her.
Career, over. Freedom, over. Life, over.
She sighed and pushed away her word puzzle. Time to get back to work. Her duties included annotating the queen’s pending mercantile contracts with references to previous ones, keeping the queen’s personal vault in the Gemstone Reserve, preparing weekly expenditure reports, and accounting the queen’s salary as a portion of taxable income from various Thaylen interests at home and abroad.
Wheeeeeeeee.
She had an audit today, which had prevented her from attending Fen’s meeting with the monarchs. She might have enjoyed seeing the Blackthorn and the Azish emperor. Well, the other aides would bring her word once the meeting was through. For now, she prepared for her audit, working by spherelight, as the reserve didn’t have windows.
The walls of her office were blank. She’d originally hung souvenirs from her years traveling, but those had reminded her of a life she could no longer have. A life full of promise. A life that had ended when she’d stupidly fallen from the head of a greatshell, and landed here, in this cripple’s chair. Now, the only memento she kept was a single pot of Shin grass.
Well, that and the little creature sleeping among the blades. Chiri-Chiri breathed softly, rippling the too-dumb grass, which didn’t pull into burrows. It grew in something called soil, which was like crem that never hardened.
Chiri-Chiri herself was a small winged beast a little longer than Rysn’s outstretched palm. The Reshi named her a larkin, and though she was the size of a large cremling, she had the snout, carapace, and build of a creature far more grand. An axehound, perhaps, with wings. A lithe little flying predator—though, for all her dangerous appearance, she sure did like to nap.
As Rysn worked, Chiri-Chiri finally stirred and peeked out from the grass, then made a series of clicking sounds with her jaw. She climbed down onto the desk and eyed the diamond mark Rysn was using for light.
“No,” Rysn said, double-checking numbers in her ledger.
Chiri-Chiri clicked again, slinking toward the gem.
“You just ate,” Rysn said, then used her palm to shoo the larkin back. “I need that for light.”
Chiri-Chiri clicked in annoyance, then flew—wings beating very quickly—to the upper reaches of the room, where she settled onto one of her favorite perches, the lintel above the doorway.
A short time later, a knock at the door interrupted Rysn’s tedium. “Come,” she said. Her man, Wmlak—who was half assistant, half porter—poked his head in.
“Let me guess,” Rysn said, “the auditor is early.” They always were.
“Yes, but…”
Behind Wmlak, Rysn caught sight of a familiar flat-topped, conical hat. Wmlak stepped back and gestured toward an old man in blue and red robes, his Thaylen eyebrows tucked behind his ears. Spry for a man past his seventieth year, Vstim had a wise but unyielding way about him. Inoffensively calculating. He carried a small box under his arm.
Rysn gasped in delight; once, she would have leaped to her feet to embrace him. Now she could only sit there and gape. “But you were off to trade in New Natanan!”
“The seas are not safe these days,” Vstim said. “And the queen requested my aid in difficult negotiations with the Alethi. I have returned, with some reluctance, to accept an appointment from Her Majesty.”
An appointment …
“In the government?” Rysn asked.
“Minister of trade, and royal liaison to the guild of shipping merchants.”
Rysn could only gape further. That was the highest civilian appointment in the kingdom. “But … Babsk, you’ll have to live in Thaylen City!”
“Well, I am feeling my age these days.”
“Nonsense. You’re as lively as I am.” Rysn glanced at her legs. “More.”
“Not so lively that I wouldn’t mind a seat…”
She realized he was still standing in the doorway to her office. Even all these months after her accident, she pushed with her arms as if to spring up and fetch him a seat. Idiot.
“Please, sit!” she said, waving toward the room’s other chair. He settled down and placed his box on the table while she twisted to do something to welcome him, leaning over—precariously—to get the teapot. The tea was cold, unfortunately. Chiri-Chiri had drained the gemstone in her fabrial hotplate.
“I can’t believe you’d agree to settle down!” she said, handing him a cup.
“Some would say that the opportunity offered me is far too important to refuse.”
“Storm that,” Rysn said. “Staying in one city will wilt you—you’ll spend your days doing paperwork and being bored.”
“Rysn,” he said, taking her hand. “Child.”
She looked away. Chiri-Chiri flew down and landed on her head, clicking angrily at Vstim.
“I promise I’m not going to hurt her,” the old man said, grinning and releasing Rysn’s hand. “Here, I brought you something. See?” He held up a ruby chip.
Chiri-Chiri considered, then hovered down above his hand—not touching it—and sucked the Stormlight out. It flew to her in a little stream, and she clicked happily, then zipped over to the pot of grass and wriggled into it, peeking out at Vstim.
“You still have the grass, I see,” he said.
“You ordered me to keep it.”
“You’re now a master merchant, Rysn! You needn’t obey the orders of a doddering old man.”
The grass rustled as Chiri-Chiri shifted. She was too big to hide in it, though that never stopped her from trying.
“Chiri-Chiri likes it,” Rysn said. “Maybe because it can’t move. Kind of like me…”
“Have you tried that Radiant who—”
“Yes. He can’t heal my legs. It’s been too long since my accident, which is appropriate. This is my consequence—payment for a contract I entered into willingly the moment I climbed down the side of that greatshell.”
“You don’t have to lock yourself away, Rysn.”
“This is a good job. You yourself got it for me.”
“Because you refused to go on further trading expeditions!”
“What good would I be? O
ne must trade from a position of power, something I can never do again. Besides, an exotic goods merchant who can’t walk? You know how much hiking is required.”
Vstim took her hand again. “I thought you were frightened. I thought you wanted something safe and secure. But I’ve been listening. Hmalka has told me—”
“You spoke to my superior?”
“People talk.”
“My work has been exemplary,” Rysn said.
“It isn’t your work she’s worried about.” He turned and brushed the grass, drawing Chiri-Chiri’s attention to his hand. She narrowed her eyes at it. “Do you remember what I told you, when you cut out that grass?”
“That I was to keep it. Until it no longer seemed odd.”
“You’ve always been so quick to make assumptions. About yourself, now, more than others. Here, perhaps this will … anyway, have a look.” Vstim handed her the box.
She frowned, then slid off the wooden lid. Inside was a wound-up cord of white rope. Beside that, a slip of paper? Rysn took out the sheet, reading it.
“A deed of ownership?” she whispered. “To a ship?”
“Brand new,” Vstim said. “A three-masted frigate, the largest I’ve ever owned—with fabrial stabilizers for storms, of the finest Thaylen engineering. I had her built in the shipyards of Klna City, which luckily sheltered her from both storms. While I’ve given the rest of my fleet—what’s left of it—to the queen for use against the invasion, this one I reserved.”
“Wandersail,” Rysn said, reading the ship’s name. “Babsk, you are a romantic. Don’t tell me you believe that old story?”
“One can believe in a story without believing it happened.” He smiled. “Whose rules are you following, Rysn? Who is forcing you to stay here? Take the ship. Go! I wish to fund your initial trade run, as an investment. After that, you’ll have to do well to maintain a vessel of this size!”
Rysn recognized the white rope now. It was a captain’s cord some twenty feet long, used as a traditional Thaylen mark of ownership. She’d wrap it in her colors and string it in the rigging of her ship.
It was a gift worth a fortune.
“I can’t take this,” she said, putting the box on the desk. “I’m sorry. I—”
He pushed the cord into her hands. “Just think about it, Rysn. Humor an old man who can no longer travel.”
She held the rope and found her eyes watering. “Bother. Babsk, I have an auditor coming today! I need to be composed and ready to account the queen’s vault!”
“Fortunately, the auditor is an old friend who has seen much worse from you than a few tears.”
“… But you’re the minister of trade!”
“They were going to make me go to a stuffy meeting with old Kholin and his soldiers,” Vstim said, leaning in, “but I insisted on coming to do this. I’ve always wanted to see the queen’s vault in person.”
Rysn wiped her tears, trying to recover some of her decorum. “Well, let’s be to it then. I assure you, everything is in order.”
* * *
The Sphere Vault’s thick steel door required three numbers to open, each rolled into a different dial, in three separate rooms. Rysn and other scribes knew one number, the door guards protected another, and an auditor—like Vstim—was typically given a third by the queen or the minister of the treasury. All were changed at random intervals.
Rysn knew for a fact that this was mostly for show. In a world of Shardblades, the real defense of the vault was in the layers of guards who surrounded the building, and—more importantly—in the careful auditing of its contents. Though novels were full of stories of the vault being robbed, the only real thefts had occurred through embezzlement.
Rysn moved her dial to the proper number, then pulled the lever in her room. The vault door finally opened with a resounding thump, and she scrambled her dial and called for Wmlak. Her porter entered, then pushed down on the back handles of her chair, lifting the front legs so he could wheel it out to meet the others.
Vstim stood by the now-open vault door with several soldiers. Today’s inner door guard—Tlik—stood with crossbow at the ready, barring entry. There was a slot that let the men stationed in the vault communicate with those outside, but the door couldn’t be opened from within.
“Scheduled accounting of the queen’s personal vault,” Rysn said to him. “Daily passcode: lockstep.”
Tlik nodded, stepping back and lowering his crossbow. Vstim entered with ledger in hand, trailed by a member of the Queen’s Guard: a rough-looking man with a shaved head and spiked eyebrows. Once they were in, Wmlak wheeled Rysn through the vault door, down a short corridor, and into a little alcove, where another guard—Fladm, today—waited.
Her porter brushed off his hands, then nodded to her and retreated. Tlik shut the vault door after him, the metal making a deep thump as it locked into place. The inner vault guards didn’t like anyone coming in who wasn’t specifically authorized—and that included her servant. She’d have to rely on the guards to move her now—but unfortunately, her large wheeled chair was too bulky to fit between the rows of shelves in the main vault.
Rysn felt a healthy dose of shame in front of her former babsk as she was taken—like a sack of roots—from her chair with rear wheels to a smaller chair with poles along the sides. Being carried was the most humiliating part.
The guards left her usual chair in the alcove, near the steps down to the lower level. Then, Tlik and the guardsman the queen had sent—Rysn didn’t know his name—took the poles and carried her into the main vault chamber.
Even here, in this job where she sat most of the time, her inability was a huge inconvenience. Her embarrassment was exacerbated as Chiri-Chiri—who wasn’t allowed in the vault for practical reasons—flitted by in a buzz of wings. How had she gotten in?
Tlik chuckled, but Rysn only sighed.
The main vault chamber was filled with metal racks, like bookcases, containing display boxes of gemstones. It smelled stale. Of a place that never changed, and was never intended to change.
The guards carried her down one of the narrow rows, light from spheres tied to their belts providing the only illumination. Rysn carried the captain’s rope in her lap, and fingered it with one hand. Surely she couldn’t take this offer. It was too generous. Too incredible.
Too difficult.
“So dark!” Vstim said. “A room full of a million gemstones, and it’s dark?”
“Most gems never leave,” Rysn said. “The personal merchant vaults are on the lower level, and there’s some light to those, with the spheres everyone has been bringing lately. These, though … they’re always here.”
Possession of these gems changed frequently, but it was all done with numbers in a ledger. It was a quirk of the Thaylen system of underwriting trades; as long as everyone was confident that these gemstones were here, large sums could change hands without risk of anything being stolen.
Each gemstone was carefully annotated with numbers inscribed both on a plate glued to its bottom and on the rack that held it. Those numbers were what people bought and sold—Rysn was shocked by how few people actually asked to come down and view the thing they were trading to own.
“0013017-36!” Vstim said. “The Benval Diamond! I owned that way back when. Memorized the number even. Huh. You know, it’s smaller than I thought it would be.”
She and the two guards led Vstim to the back wall, which held a series of smaller metal vault doors. The main vault behind them was silent; no other scribes were working today, though Chiri-Chiri did flit past. She hovered down toward the queen’s guardsman—eyeing the spheres on his belt—but Rysn snatched her from the air.
Chiri-Chiri griped, buzzing her wings against Rysn’s hand and clicking. Rysn blushed, but held tight. “Sorry.”
“Must be like a buffet for her down here!” Tlik said.
“A buffet of empty plates,” Rysn said. “Keep an eye on your belt, Tlik.”
The two guards set her chair down near
a specific vault. With her free hand, Rysn dug a key from her pocket and handed it to Vstim. “Go ahead. Vault Thirteen.”
Vstim unlocked and swung open the smaller vault-within-the-vault, which was roughly the size of a closet.
Light poured from it.
The shelves inside were filled with gemstones, spheres, jewelry, and even some mundane objects like letters and an old knife. But the most stunning item in the collection was obviously the large ruby on the center shelf. The size of a child’s head, it glowed brightly.
The King’s Drop. Gemstones of its size weren’t unheard of—most greatshells had gemhearts as big. What made the King’s Drop unique was that it was still glowing—over two hundred years after being first locked into the vault.
Vstim touched it with one finger. The light shone with such brilliance that the room seemed almost to be in daylight, though shaded bloodred by the gemstone’s color.
“Amazing,” Vstim whispered.
“As far as scholars can tell,” Rysn said, “the King’s Drop never loses its Stormlight. A stone this large should have run out after a month. It’s something about the crystal lattice, the lack of flaws and imperfections.”
“They say it’s a chunk off the Stone of Ten Dawns.”
“Another story?” Rysn said. “You are a romantic.”
Her former babsk smiled, then placed a cloth shade over the gemstone to reduce its glare so it wouldn’t interfere with their work. He opened his ledger. “Let’s start with the smaller gemstones and work our way up, shall we?”
Rysn nodded.
The queen’s guard killed Tlik.
He did it with a knife, right into the neck. Tlik dropped without a word, though the sound of the knife being ripped free shocked Rysn. The treacherous guard knocked against her chair, toppling her over as he slashed at Vstim.
The enemy underestimated the merchant’s spryness. Vstim dodged backward into the queen’s vault, screaming, “Murder! Robbery! Raise the alarm!”
Rysn untangled herself from her toppled chair and, panicked, pulled herself away by her arms, dragging legs like cordwood. The murderer reached into the vault to deal with her babsk, and she heard a grunt.
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