DESPERATE ALLIANCES Page 5

  Tulkhan hauled the ship’s captain aside. For a merchant who lived the good life, he wielded a sword efficiently. “Up anchor, Kornel.”

  Tulkhan sounded the horn, signaling retreat, then fought his way to the mast to free the sails. The ship’s oarsmen were too busy fighting for their lives. The sails bellied down and the growing dawn breeze filled the canvas. Imperceptibly at first, the ship gathered momentum. To Tulkhan’s relief, the other great merchant ships also spread their sails.

  Shouts then screams rent the air as two merchant ships rode dangerously close. Tulkhan ran to the side, watching helplessly as his ships crushed a small skiff.

  Anger drove him across the deck into the mercenaries. They fell back, and the tenure of the fighting changed as they realized they were about to be carried from the harbor. On an unseen signal the mercenaries sheathed their weapons and leapt overboard. It was what Tulkhan expected. Only a zealot fought to the death.

  But the ships turned ponderously, and there were still the sandbars to negotiate. Burning arrows hit the decks and sails. Men abandoned weapons to drown the flames and throw bodies overboard. Tulkhan saw a fishing boat burning unhindered to the waterline.

  When cheering broke from the observers on the docks, fury consumed Tulkhan. Dousing his head in a pitcher of water, he shook the droplets from his skin, shoved the damp hair from his face, and turned to assess their situation.

  A sailor threw a bucket of seawater across the deck, sending entrails sliding like foam on a wave’s crest. Tulkhan strode to the captain at the helm. “We’ll go over the Seawall and come at them across land.”

  “Can’t be done. These ships can’t get in close enough.”

  “We’ll lower the boats and row in.”

  “Can’t be done in these numbers. We’d churn up the mud, be stuck like beached whales.”

  “Then where is the nearest harbor?”

  “All the Low-land harbors are defended. But there is another way to get at Port Sumair. A way they wouldn’t expect.” The captain glanced at Tulkhan, his features defined by cunning.

  The General felt a surge of interest. That was the calculating look of a man who lived by his wits. Perhaps Kernel’s ample belly was a recent acquisition. “Go on.”

  “It is difficult, but not impossible. I did it before I commanded ships this size. You’d have to use the small vessels.”

  “That’s good. The merchant ships could blockade the port, misleading them about our intentions,” Tulkhan muttered, thinking aloud. His spirits lifted. He had learned to surround himself with men who had local knowledge, and he knew how to heed advice. “Tell me more.”

  As the ship left the harbor and took a bearing northeast, Tulkhan saw the sun break over the peaks of Fair Isle. He was not going back to Imoshen until victory was his.

  Chapter Four

  Imoshen expected news of Tulkhan with the following dawn’s tide, but the new day brought no news, and when the late tide arrived with no message, Imoshen felt the mood of Northpoint change. From the candle trimmer to the harbormaster, cautious optimism was replaced with growing concern. She hugged Ashmyr closer.

  As Imoshen approached T’Ronynn’s Tower, a servant’s gesture reminded her of Selita, the rebel who had been her maid while Reothe had her imprisoned. On impulse, Imoshen called, “Selita?”

  The girl responded instinctively to her name.

  Silently, Imoshen beckoned. Selita cast one desperate glance around the bustling courtyard, then followed her up the tower’s steps.

  “What are you doing here?” Imoshen whispered. After Drake’s attempt to free Reothe, Tulkhan’s men were eager to avenge their comrade’s death.

  Selita stiffened. “I am ready to die for Reothe!”

  “Dying is easy. It is living that’s hard!” Imoshen chewed her bottom lip. She had discussed nothing of importance with Reothe, at first because he was so ill, later because she was careful never to be alone with him. The last she had heard, the nobles of the Keldon Highlands were ready to rise up in rebellion. She came to a snap decision. “As it happens, Reothe does have a task for you. He wants you to carry a message to his supporters.”

  The girl looked skeptical.

  “I haven’t called my guards to arrest you, have I?”

  “I would hear this from Reothe’s own lips.”

  “Very well. We shall go to him.” Imoshen strode up the circular stairs with Selita at her side.

  Acknowledging the guards, Imoshen motioned the girl into Reothe’s room and closed the heavy door. “I bring you a visitor, kinsman.”

  As Reothe struggled to lift his head, Selita ran to the bedside and fell to her knees with a sob. “My T’En lord, your beautiful eyes!”

  “Selita, you’ll get yourself killed,” Reothe rebuked.

  “I have explained that we decided to call off the Keldon uprising because Fair Isle cannot afford civil war while Tulkhan is on the mainland,” Imoshen bluffed desperately. “But Selita wants to hear the orders from your own lips before she carries your message to Woodvine of the Keld.” Holding Reothe’s gaze, Imoshen prayed he would rise above personal ambition and consider Fair Isle’s fate. “I am here to write your message.”

  A rueful smile tugged at Reothe’s lips. “I heard how Woodvine refused to call you Empress because you had not earned that title. She does not know you as I do.” He sighed. “You are right, Imoshen, we cannot have civil war.”

  Relieved, she went to the desk and selected paper, flicking the excess ink off the scriber. After a moment Reothe began to dictate a letter to the iron-haired matriarch of the Keldon nobles. Imoshen wrote swiftly. Finally she sanded the paper, blowing off the excess.

  “What if the Lady Woodvine does not believe they are truly your words?” Selita asked, still kneeling by Reothe’s bed.

  “Tell her to go to my grandfather, Lord Athlyng, and tell him it was Reothe, not his cousin Murgon, who spilled ink on the map of the mainland and, for this, Reothe begs his pardon.”

  “Satisfied, Selita?” Imoshen asked, thinking it was strange the paths their lives took. Murgon was now a high-ranking church official, leader of the Tractarians, who were trained to hunt down rogue T’En.

  She held the candle over the folded message until a pool of wax formed, then went to Reothe, who pressed the tip of his left hand’s sixth finger in the wax.

  Imoshen held it to the light. “So it is true—only the T’En have the double spiral.”

  He laughed. “Ever the scholar. And if you were to compare ours they would differ. When there were more of us we were taught to recognize the patterns at a glance.”

  A sense of loss overwhelmed Imoshen. The mysteries of the T’En were her heritage, but Reothe had hidden the T’Elegos, the history her namesake, Imoshen the First, had written the autumn before she died.

  “From my hand, to yours, to Lady Woodvine’s.” As Imoshen gave Selita the sealed missive, there was a knock at the door.

  “Ghebites!” Selita hid the message.

  Imoshen placed a calming hand on her arm. “Yes?”

  A guard opened the door. “Lord Commander Wharrd awaits you, Lady Protector.”

  “Very well,” Imoshen said. “Come, Selita.”

  Imoshen walked the girl from the room, turning to the guard. “Provide a safe escort for my servant. She is returning to her family for the birth of her sister’s child.” Imoshen saw the man’s eyes glaze over and smiled to herself. The Ghebites’ lack of interest in anything that belonged to the “female” world made them easy to manipulate.

  Imoshen held Selita’s eyes. “The fate of one individual, no matter how dear to us, does not compare to the fate of our people.”

  When Selita had gone, Imoshen went upstairs to her chamber, where she found Wharrd waiting before the fireplace. She crossed the room to place Ashmyr in his basket. “Send a ship to Port Sumair. I must know how it goes with Tulkhan. Defeat I can deal with, but this silence ...”

  Wharrd nodded, gave the salute he would have given
his general, and departed.

  Thinking of the T’Elegos had reminded Imoshen of Reothe’s bonding gift. She wedged a chair against the door, then opened her chest, taking out the T’Enchiridion. This was her great-aunt’s volume, worn by her many years’ service to the church. On her hundredth birthday her great-aunt had been given the title of Aayel in recognition for that service. When Imoshen was a child, the Aayel had made her memorize the prayers for the dead and the newborn. But this copy of the T’Enchiridion contained more.

  Imoshen’s heart thudded as she eased her fingers inside the book’s back cover, sliding out a slender, scuffed volume.

  At risk to his own life, Reothe had come to her on the day they had planned to bond, the anniversary of her eighteenth birthing day. And even though she had broken her vows to him, he had given her this. She should not have accepted it, but...

  Imoshen stroked the embossing on the kidskin cover. T’Endomaz. The T’En book of Lore. Opening the book to the title page, she read the childlike script. T’Ashmyr. Her son, Ashmyr, was named after the greatest Throwback T’En emperor of the Age of Tribulation. During those turbulent years, Fair Isle had needed a warrior emperor. She hoped she had not foretold her son’s future.

  If this book belonged to T’Ashmyr himself, it was five hundred years old and should have been redolent with great age. But when she flexed her T’En senses there was no trace of time. Someone had wiped the book clean. This convinced Imoshen that she held an artifact dating from the first hundred years of settlement. She closed her eyes and concentrated on what her fingers told her. The book’s fine kidskin cover was worn in six places by the fingertips of many T’En hands.

  Anger coursed through her. She was heir to the knowledge the T’Endomaz contained, yet she could not read it because the contents were encrypted. The T’Elegos had to contain the key, but Reothe would not reveal where he had hidden it. Tulkhan was right—she could not trust him.

  * * *

  As the General’s small skiff pulled away, he looked up at the merchant ship riding tall above the waves. Its sails glowed in the sunset while Tulkhan and his craft were already in twilight. It seemed symbolic of their separate tasks. Peirs was to return and blockade the port with the three merchant ships.

  The remaining fishing vessels and small skiffs, heavily laden with men and supplies, were to follow Kornel upriver through the marshes to a village where they would force one of the marsh-dwellers to show them the safe path to the Marsh-wall. Beyond that wall lay the reclaimed Low-lands, ripe and unready for battle. Tulkhan intended to force-march his men across the plain and attack Port Sumair’s landward gate while its defenders were watching the sea. But if he couldn’t get his men across the marshlands and into position to attack Sumair at the agreed time, Peirs’s sea attack would be a slaughter.

  The skiff nudged a larger fishing vessel, and eager arms extended to haul up Tulkhan and his crew. Now his flagship was a fishing trawler with no cabin and a shallow keel, which, according to Kornel, would carry them deep into the marshlands before they had to abandon it. Without the captain’s local knowledge. Tulkhan could not hope to spearhead an attack through the supposedly impenetrable marshlands. But he had not told Imoshen this. His message to Imoshen merely informed her of his intention to blockade Port Sumair and ordered the mercenary troop’s execution.

  Ducking the low beam of the sail, Tulkhan strode to the bow to join Kornel. His odd fleet was already moving into the mouth of the river, the sails reflecting the moonlight now that the last of the sun’s rays had faded from the sky.

  He had been warned there would be times when they would have to carry the boats across sandbanks. Strange— the trees had not looked so tall and menacing when he had stood on the merchant ship’s desk. Then the marshlands had spread out before him like a tapestry laced with gold thread as the setting sun gilded the many small pools and waterways. And edging those sinuous river paths were the saltwater trees of the Low-lands. They hung broodingly over the river’s banks, marching boldly into the water itself.

  “We’re making good time,” Kornel observed.

  A sailor gave them their evening meal: two chunks of salted meat and wine. Gnawing on the tough flesh, Tulkhan noticed something moving on the far bank. “What’s that?”

  The captain beckoned a man to the rudder and took a lantern to the side of the boat. Tulkhan joined him. It was hard to distinguish anything, just a blur of trunks.

  “Look for their eyes. They reflect the light. The narcts are the reason we couldn’t risk getting stuck in the mud near the Sea-wall.”

  “Seagoing predators?”

  “They hunt them out of the port. But here... watch this.” Kornel tossed the remains of his meat over the side. It fell halfway between the ship and the tree line. Before it hit the water, things slithered out from the cover of the trees, plowing through the river, their wakes glowing in the moonlight.

  The creatures converged on the meat. Jaws flashed, teeth gleamed. The snap and crunch as they fought was sickening.

  Tulkhan grunted. “Greedy beasts, these narcts.”

  He tossed his bone overboard. A protest died on Kornel’s lips. A series of barks sounded up and down the riverbank.

  “They sound like dogs and they’re just clever enough to hunt in packs. One narct couldn’t bring a man down on dry land, but in the water it’s another matter, and when you get a hunting pack...” Kornel spat.

  Tulkhan watched as the frenzy of feeding slipped behind them, disappearing in their wake, but the barking of the narcts echoed up and down the river. Any carrying of boats across sandbanks would be fraught with danger.

  Imoshen nursed Ashmyr as she read Tulkhan’s message. Four long days had elapsed since the General attacked Port Sumair. Before Wharrd could find a seaworthy craft to make the crossing, a small fishing skiff had arrived with a hasty note scribbled in the General’s own hand. After failing to take the port, Tulkhan set up a blockade. This did not surprise Imoshen. She had known that he would not return until he could claim victory. It was his order to execute the mercenaries that worried her. She met Wharrd’s eyes. “By now all of Northpoint will know I have heard from the General and they’ll have guessed the worst. The mercenaries will be sharpening their weapons.”

  “They were held as surety. Their lives are forfeit.”

  Imoshen laughed. “You speak as if they will simply put down their arms and march to their deaths at the hands of my people.” She did not want to sacrifice her people in a bloodbath. Perhaps something could be salvaged from this. “Send for the town officials, the merchant leaders, the guild-masters, and the new leader of the mercenaries. I will see them in the public hall.”

  When Imoshen walked into the Citadel’s great hall it was so closely packed she could not see the mosaic floor tiles. With Kalleen at her heels carrying her son, she made her way to the dais, stepping into a growing well of silent expectation.

  Imoshen raised her voice. “Sumair did not fall to a frontal attack. The Protector General has blockaded the port. But do not despair; tell your families and friends that in the eleven years General Tulkhan led his army, no fortified town ever withstood him. It is only a matter of time before Sumair falls and King Gharavan is captured.”

  A wave of comment greeted her words. The harbormaster approached Imoshen, bristling with indignation. “We thought victory was certain. What went wrong?”

  “The mercenary leader revealed General Tulkhan’s attack to the defenders at Port Sumair.” Imoshen beckoned the new leader. “Step forward, Lightfoot.”

  He wore the serviceable boots, breeches, and jerkin of his mercenary trade, his weapons better cared for than his garments. His sun-lined features reminded Imoshen of the veterans Wharrd and Peirs. Good. If he had survived this long in his profession, he would not be hotheaded. Like many of the mainlanders, he would not meet her eyes, but this time the Dhamfeer tales served her purpose. Let him fear her.

  “Tourez betrayed your mercenary troop.” As Imoshen spok
e, the crowd renewed its angry muttering. “In doing this he forfeited your lives.”

  Lightfoot’s mouth thinned but he did not argue.

  “General Tulkhan lays siege to Sumair while Tourez shelters within its walls. By rights I should honor the General’s agreement and have you all executed.”

  A muscle jumped in Lightfoot’s jaw.

  “But I seek a practical solution that is fair to everyone. I assume Tourez’s actions negate the validity of any contract he negotiated on your behalf?” Imoshen asked.

  “What?” He was startled by her change of subject.

  “This leaves you free to negotiate a new contract of hire. Am I right?” Imoshen asked, watching him closely. Within a heartbeat she saw his leap of understanding. He wanted an honorable, bloodless solution as much as she did, and he wanted revenge on the leader who had betrayed him. “While I could order the execution of your troop, I am sure your men would sell their lives dearly, and I see no point in shedding their blood or that of my own people.” She smiled at Lightfoot’s expression. He had not expected such plain speaking. “In return for your lives, I ask that your men take up arms against King Gharavan. Will you fight at General Tulkhan’s side?”

  “We will.”

  “Bring me ink and paper.” Imoshen signaled Wharrd, who was ready with the agreement she had already drawn up. Even so, she felt light-headed with relief. “We will sign a new contract, which you will deliver into the General’s hands.”

  The mercenary was a lettered man, able to read and write.

  “Lightfoot is not a Vaygharian name,” she remarked.

  “It is the name I have gone by for nearly twenty years.”

  The man was hiding his true identity. Imoshen wondered if he would be as treacherous as Tourez. She did not want to send Tulkhan a faulty tool or, worse, a tool that would turn on him. If only there was some way to ensure that Lightfoot would honor the contract.

  After dripping the wax onto the document, Imoshen held up her left hand and curled all but the smallest sixth finger into her palm. “This is my T’En seal.”