Again she continued to talk, but I’d learned to filter the words out. The unending flow of conversation didn’t keep her from doing her job any more than his virtual silence kept Ram from doing his. We glided to a low dock and Losywa threw the painter rope to a man standing there, who quickly wrapped it around a low post.
“Couldn’t you have just done that yourself?” Dee asked. “Seems inefficient for someone to just stand around to tie up boats.”
“I could. But that’s a dockworkers’ guild job. And if I did it, I’d get sideways with the dockworkers’ guild. And if you want to work in Delta City, you really don’t want to be sideways with the dockworkers’ guild.” She tossed the man a small coin, which vanished into a pocket in his tunic. Whatever the amount, it seemed excessive for thirty second worth of winding a rope, but I understood her point and kept my mouth shut.
“Come on, I’ll take you down to Pier 26,” Losywa said. She turned a big smile on Legion. “After we settle up the remainder of the fee, of course.”
“Of course,” the wraith smiled back. It counted out nine gold coins that shone in the sunlight. The dockworker’s eyes bugged out. Losywa was a big woman, and Ram was built like an ape, but I wondered how safe they would be on the docks with that much gold in their pockets.
Dee and Losywa kept up their conversation as they walked, and Tess went in front with them, two tall women and a tall man breaking a trail through the crowds. Ram and Cat followed behind, guarding Losywa and Tess. Cat was perhaps half Ram’s weight, but almost certainly the more dangerous of the two. Legion walked with me, trailed by its silent, soulless guards.
“Soon the final leg of our journey begins, Judge Minos.” The wraith sounded far too happy about that.
“I can hardly wait.”
“This is Pier 26, Ambassador,” Losywa announced. There was nothing there. The wraith abruptly looked far less pleased.
Losywa and Ram had gone to ask around. The rest of us stood on the pier, attracting the occasional stare. Even in this cosmopolitan port, we were an odd group. My stomach was beginning that long, slow, never-ending descent I associated with upcoming battles. If we got into a fight, things would get very ugly very quickly.
It was amazing how happy I was to see the siblings again. At least until Losywa started explaining.
“So, here’s the thing,” she said. “Apparently the captain of the Sea Star - that’s the ship that was here - I guess that was your ship, Ambassador? Well, apparently he got drunk and started bragging about the important connections he had to the Darklands government. Which really wasn’t a good idea. Because it’s one thing to trade with the Darklands and the Shield. But the Heart is still at war with them. So shooting off your mouth about being an agent of their government? Not a good idea.”
“What happened?” Legion demanded.
“They burned him alive, sold the crew into slavery, and sailed the ship out into the bay and sank it.”
Wow. Not a good idea at all. Apparently the Green Heart was still taking the Shield’s invasion very personally. “Was it a lynch mob that did that, or the authorities?” I asked.
“Hard to tell. If it wasn’t the authorities doing it, they really didn’t do anything to stop it.”
“Unacceptable!” Legion roared, its face twisting into a snarl that didn’t look human at all. The wraith whirled and slammed its fist into a piling. Wood and bone splintered. The creature’s next cry was wordless, inarticulate, and it smashed its other hand into the piling. The beam, nearly a foot in diameter, cracked down the middle.
I had seen enough combat to know the second blow had pulped not just the bones in the wraith’s fist, but its wrist as well.
Legion’s face was perfectly controlled when it turned back to me, although the ambassador’s lips were parted just enough to reveal its fangs. The Darkness was visibly at work in its hands, closing torn skin and rebuilding fractured bones.
I was sickened, more by memory than by the wraith’s inhumanity. I’d done something similar once when the Darkness had been in me, except my target had been a human being’s face rather than a post.
“Well,” Legion said calmly, as if nothing had happened. “It seems we need another alternative. I will find us another ship, or passage overland.”
“You’re insane,” I retorted. “A Select and a paleo are going to draw attention. And once people figure out what you and the soulless are, they’re going to kill us all. Weren’t you paying attention, wraith? They burned a man alive just for being associated with you. In the Source, Tess and I are respected enough that we could get you accepted, even when you pulled something stupid like you did back at Eeltown. This isn’t the Source. If you try to book passage with a ship or a caravan, we aren’t going to last ten minutes.”
“I have an idea,” Losywa volunteered. “Depending on how much more gold is in that bag.”
There was a lot more gold in the bag. And that’s how we found ourselves the owners of a forty foot, two-masted sailboat.
“It’s a coast runner,” Losywa explained. “Not big enough to handle a storm out in the Warm Sea. But if we stay close to shore, it should get us to Seafields. That’s where you’re headed, right, Ambassador?”
Legion nodded.
“And you can pilot this in open water?” Dee asked. “Because I’m given to understand that a sailboat on the sea is rather a different thing from a raft on a river.”
“Of course,” Losywa assured the occultist. He didn’t seem completely convinced. I had no idea. As far as I was concerned, a boat was a boat. As long as I stayed on the inside and the water stayed on the outside, the rest of the details weren’t my problem.
The same dockhand who had helped tie up the raft appeared to unmoor the sailboat. It seemed odd to me that one man would cover so much of the waterfront, until he spoke quietly to Losywa. “Seems like you and yours are in quite the hurry and spending quite the cash, missy.”
“My passengers really are in a bit of a rush, yes.”
“I’d hate to think that’s ’cause they’re doing something illegal. Like something a patriot should report to the militia. Unless they’re just real generous? In which case, I’m sure they won’t mind sharing.”
Losywa sighed. “And you had in mind?”
“A hundred weight in silver.”
It was a ridiculous sum, more than a month of a laborer’s wages… although only a tenth the value of one of the gold coins Legion had been so free with.
“My passengers are generous, but not idiots. Ten weight.”
“Ten weight’ll get you a fine rush job with the painter, no lie. But to keep my mouth sealed tight shut when the troops come walking by? That’s worth ninety more, sure.”
“And yet there are easier ways to ensure silence,” Legion drawled.
“No,” I said. “We discussed this.”
“You said I was not to murder citizens of the Source. We are not in the Source any longer, Judge Minos, so this man cannot be its citizen. Nor do you have anything resembling authority to give orders here.”
“I said no. Get it out of him.”
It was finally beginning to dawn on the dockhand that in his greed he might have bitten off more than he could chew. But he masked the fear beginning to cloud his face with a stubborn set of his jaw. “Don’t think you can threaten me, blackeye. I’ve got friends.”
“Who will never hear your call before Legion stops your throat, and who would only die if they heard and came to help. The Darkness is in you. You’ve been infected. Take your ten silver and go. You could tell the militia what’s happened here… but then they’d burn you alive to get it out of you. Whereas after we leave peacefully, it will trickle out and away… in time. Long after we’re gone.”
The dockworker looked from me to Cat, who was grinning like a fiend, and then at Legion’s four utterly silent guards. When his gaze landed on the ambassador, the wraith smiled wide enough to reveal all its fangs.
Losywa handed over a single silver coi
n and the man fled.
“My way is better,” Legion said.
I shivered. “I’ve done things your way. I’ve been to hell and back. I’d rather not visit again.”
The wraith chuckled. “Then you might want to walk back home now.”
Dee had been right. The sailboat wasn’t the raft, and the sea wasn’t the river. The waters of the Brown Bay were calm enough, and Losywa seemed competent with the sails. Ram didn’t look happy, but I attributed that to the idea of another week with Legion.
Once we cleared the bay, though, the wind picked up, and gentle swells turned into violent waves. Losywa fought to keep us moving parallel to the coast. Ram didn’t seem to have much more idea of how to trim or tack than I did, although at least he knew that sheets and shrouds were ropes and not, as I would have assumed, some part of the sails - which looked more like sheets and shrouds to me.
In a moment of calm, I asked our captain, “How likely is this thing to capsize?” That was a nautical term I’d figured out pretty quickly.
She shook her head. “Not really likely at all. The wind’s fierce out here, but the boat’s stable. It’s built for this, you know. So unless a hurricane blows up… Now, if there’s a hurricane, well, then I guess we’d really better start praying. Because -”
“You can stop talking now.” I made my way over to Prophetess. “I know you said it’s usually not a two-way conversation between you and God, but if you wanted to mention to him that we’d rather not drown, it couldn’t hurt.”
She glared at me, and I thought she was going to say something about how inappropriate it was to treat the Lord like some kind of wishing well. But then she crossed herself, closed her eyes, and began murmuring under her breath.
“You might also tell him how sorry I am for all the awful things I’ve done. And said. And thought.”
She opened her eyes. “You can tell him that yourself.”
Yeah, great. Wasn’t that her job? She had the direct line to God. My skill set these days seemed to mostly center around killing people, and getting myself smacked around. I was doing my part - I could use some collaboration on hers in the areas that were outside my expertise.
The wind came up again, harder than before. Tess’ hair streamed and tossed in the gusts. The sea heaved and swelled like something alive. Or like the wrath of God. It came to me abruptly that against a living opponent, even one like Yoshana or Gurath, there was something I could do. Or at least imagine I could do. In the grip of the angry ocean, there was nothing. The wind and waves would throw us over, or they wouldn’t.
I closed my eyes and stood in the spray, humbled before the divine. There was an arrogance in the Select. Or at least in me. We considered ourselves better than other men, and in some ways, we were. I realized that I had always thought myself superior - intellectually, physically, even morally. A huge part of my self-image was wrapped up in what I could do. But against the vastness of the ocean, of the universe, of its Creator, I was very small indeed.
“Forgive me my pride, Lord. Have mercy on your servant, a sinner.” I didn’t say the words out loud, but maybe for the first time I felt that I meant them in my heart.
There are no atheists in foxholes, the ancients had said. Or, apparently, in storms at sea.
Losywa shouted at Ram. “Reef the mainsail! More!” Whatever else she said I didn’t hear. The two of them fought the sails and the rudder, and the rest of us tried to stay out of the way and not go overboard. Gusts of wind tore at our clothes, and a hard rain like a thousand pebbles battered at us.
And then it was over, and the sails slumped limp in the sudden calm.
“Well, that was exciting,” Losywa said. “Ram, ease the sheets.”
Her brother let out line, but there was no breeze to catch. “The weather out here really is the darnedest thing,” she said.
“There’s a reason we work on the river, Loo,” Ram grunted.
“Where’s your sense of adventure, Ram?”
“Pretty sure I left it back at Eeltown. How about you drop me off on shore and I’ll go back for it?”
Two years past, I’d said almost the same words to Doctor John Dee on the way to Our Lady. I clapped Ram on the shoulder. “One of these days I’ll tell you what adventure really looks like.” And if he had any sense, he’d never leave Eeltown again after hearing that story.
“Tell us now,” Losywa demanded, excited as a child.
I looked over at Legion, still dry as a bone despite the soaking the rest of us had taken, and still with the little smirk on its face. I wasn’t sure how much of my tale I wanted to tell in front of the wraith.
“Ah, where to begin?” mused Dee. “Our friend Minos met Prophetess while he was salvaging garbage a few hundred miles west of here in Rockwall, but I met the two of them in a village called Brambledge. And I suppose that’s as good a place to begin as any, because that -” he paused for effect, “is where Prophetess first cast the Darkness out of a person, and truly came into her own. And I’m pleased to be able to say that I was present for the event itself…”
And he was off. There was as much chance of shutting him up as there was of putting the sea into a bucket.
The breeze didn’t come back as the hours - and Dee’s story - dragged on. The sea was perfectly calm, but there was a reason why “becalmed” was a bad word in sailing. We weren’t going anywhere. I considered suggesting that we could put the windbag occultist behind the sails - all that hot air coming out of his mouth had to be good for something.
I practiced humility and kept my own mouth shut instead.
It was twilight by the time Dee wound down, and there was still no wind. Losywa looked around at the flat, empty ocean in concern. “If it stays like this for too long, we’re in trouble. I didn’t really pack enough provisions for all of us to just sit here for weeks.”
“We can adjust easily enough,” Legion said.
With a lightning stroke of one long, sharp claw, it tore out the throat of one of its guards. The body flopped to the deck, twitched, and was still. “I do not require their services any longer. Now this one does not need to eat and can instead be food.”
Losywa clapped her hands to her mouth and ran to the far end of the boat. Ram followed her. Tess and Dee had seen plenty of death before, but both stared at the wraith in horror before turning away.
Legion grinned at me. “They have no soul or will, Judge Minos. They are not human in a meaningful way. They are just meat.”
The other three bodyguards remained utterly impassive, unmoved by what had happened to their comrade or the thought that they might be next.
“Yeah, that’s what the last person who murdered one of them in front of me said. I didn’t like it when she did it either, and at least they were her enemies.”
The wraith’s fanged grin widened. It pulled a knife from its belt and knelt next to the corpse. “Then shall I take it you won’t be eating?”
“No, we won’t.”
“A pity. There’s too much for me and my remaining guards to finish before the meat spoils. A shame for it to go to waste.”
Cat met my eyes. Alone of us, she hadn’t looked disgusted. She looked hungry. Of course, when we’d first met, she’d been planning to eat me.
“No, Cat,” I snapped. “We don’t eat people. Not even soulless ones, or soulless bodies possessed by Darkness wraiths.”
“Waste,” she grumbled, and turned away with one last long glance at the body Legion was starting to butcher.
We kept to the bow of the boat after that, with Legion and its surviving guards in the stern. Unfortunately that meant Losywa had to go to their end to steer. Ram and I went with her, because she wouldn’t go alone. I didn’t blame her at all.
The wind came back in irregular fits and starts. It never left us becalmed again, but twice more it grew violent enough to tip us and spray water across the deck. I didn’t mind. It washed away the blood of the dead guard.
On the fifth day, Losywa said, “If we k
eep up this speed, we should get to Seafields tomorrow.”
“Bet you won’t be sad to see the last of us.”
“I really won’t. That’s for sure. Not you, Judge Minos. It was an honor, helping you and Prophetess. My duty as a citizen.” Although of course she’d profited from it hugely - or would, if she survived. “But I don’t ever want to see the ambassador again. I really don’t.”
“You and me both.”
“Do you really have to go with him? Once you’re in the Shield, or the Darklands, who knows what he might do?”
I sucked in a long breath. “That thing’s not a ‘he.’ It’s an ‘it.’ And I’m sure it hates me, but it’s following the orders of something more powerful.”
“And you’re really sure whoever’s giving the orders wishes you well?”
I was almost completely sure Gurath did not. When you put it that way, what were we thinking? It wasn’t too late to destroy the Darklands’ monstrous ambassador and turn back… but it would be soon.
I sighed. “Nope. But I’m hoping he might not want a war, at least not right now. And that makes it worth the risk to talk to him.”
She surprised me by giving me a hug. “You’re a good man.”
“In a whole lot of ways I’m really not. But I’m trying.”
The next morning there were green sails on the horizon.
“Green Heart patrols,” Losywa said. “I’d heard about this.”
“News to me. I don’t remember patrols from when I lived here.” Not that I’d spent much time near the sea back then.
“Well, there wouldn’t have been a need, would there?” Dee chimed in. “Before they took Seafields, the Shield couldn’t have launched a naval assault unless they sailed around the Rat Shoals, and I’m told that’s positively suicidal.”
I nodded. East of Seafields lay a sunken peninsula. When the seas had risen in the Last Days, a spur of land hundreds of miles long had been covered by water. But it was far too shallow to navigate, and broken shards of buildings thrust up out of it. To go around was to risk the even fiercer winds that blew farther from shore.
Passing Through Darkness- The Complete Cycle Page 83