Of Sea and Shadow (The Elder Empire: Sea Book 1) (26 page)

“We need him,” Alsa said. If she could establish some sort of camaraderie with this uncrowned Emperor, maybe she could get him to listen.

“We don’t need him, we need his
ship,”
Naberius corrected. “And I can take control of it. That’s why I can’t let them stay a day or two out, General Teach. That ship might well pack up and swim away.”

Alsa looked from him to the Magister. “Can he do that? He has to bond the Heart, if this plan is to work. He can’t do that
and
take control of
The Testament
. Can he?”

“It’s technically possible,” Maxeus allowed. “But it would be unspeakably difficult, and I can’t imagine it taking less than two weeks.”

Naberius wore a confident smile like a mask. “You must learn to trust me, Maxeus. I can do things that no one else can.”

The Magister shrugged. “If he believes he can do it, then I have no further objection. Though this does seem extreme. I would think the easiest course would be to simply
pay
Captain Marten and let him do his job.”

Finally!
Alsa thought.
A reasonable voice.

But Naberius turned to the Magister with a sympathetic, condescending look that dashed her hopes to pieces. “Mekendi, my friend, you have to trust me. I’ve spent the last three weeks on that man’s ship. I have Read every inch, every board on that vessel. And I have done my best to get to know the Captain. No matter what he says, no matter what he may even tell himself, there is absolutely no chance that he will ever follow my leadership. He simply doesn’t have it in him. I believe he thinks of himself as a…rival, of sorts. No, he has to go.”

Reluctantly, Professor Maxeus nodded.

General Teach actually seemed soothed by the Chronicler’s speech. With her concerns addressed, she rose from her seat and marched over to the door, armor clanking with every step. She leaned a head out of the cracked door, speaking softly to one of her Guards.

Alsa slumped back against the hull, despair settling over her like a cold blanket. Maybe she ought to fight for it anyway. It was somehow worse knowing what was going to happen and being unable to stop it than
trying
to stop it and dying in the process.

On her way back to the bench, Teach stopped in front of Alsa. In a rare display of humanity, she placed a gauntleted hand on Alsa’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you were here for this, Grayweather. I will make it painless.”

Tears welled up in Alsa’s eyes, and she nodded. Sad to say, but those were the most touching words she’d ever heard out of the General’s mouth.

Naberius straightened his red coat, adjusting the buttons, and then picked up his case of candles. “Well, I’d better keep an eye on my ship. Ladies, gentleman, it’s been a pleasure as always.”

General Teach pushed her way out the door, and Naberius swept out behind her without another word.

Maxeus sighed and leaned back in his chair. “I’m very sorry. Grayweather, is it? You should not have been allowed to hear that.”

In spite of herself, Alsa agreed. It was normally her policy to face unpleasant truths head-on, rather than hiding in denial, but today...if there was nothing she could do to save her son, then what was the point of even knowing about it?

She would have to ask her Guild Head.

Bliss was missing from the bench, but that wasn’t unusual. Alsa leaned over, calling under the table. “The meeting is over, Guild Head. We need to leave.”

“Not you,” Maxeus corrected, his voice regretful. “I’m sorry, but I must ask you to stay here with me for the time being.”

Alsa’s fist tightened on the grip of her sword until her knuckles flared with pain. The Magister could probably reduce her to ashes with a thought, if the rumors were true, but he was still only one man. Maybe if she were fast enough...

He sighed through his mask. “Please don’t make me subdue you. It’s difficult to do so gently.”

Alsa gestured under the table. “Can Bliss leave, at least?”

“I have no orders to the contrary.”

Alsa screamed under the table, a normally unforgivable breach in propriety.
“Guild Head!
Come out of there, now!”

Nothing. Not a sound.

She dropped to her knees, searching as if for a small child.

There was no one under the table.

She straightened, glancing to every corner of the room. Slowly, a smile crawled across her face.

The Magister’s mask tilted. “What is it?”

“Where’s Bliss?” she asked softly.

Maxeus looked under the table himself, and Alsa took her opportunity.

She vaulted over the table, saber clearing its sheath.
 

One of the Magister’s hands shot out for his burnt staff, but he was too slow. She landed with her knees on the table, jerking one foot out and kicking the dark wood out of his reach. With the other hand, she pressed the point of her sword against the underside of his chin.

“I’m sorry, Professor, but I must ask you to stay here with me until my son’s ship has departed.”

“Fair enough,” the Magister said calmly, raising both hands. “I sympathize with you, Grayweather, I really do. But this is rash.”

I hope Bliss is using this time well,
she thought.

If the Guild Head strolled back through this door and asked what was going on, Alsa was going to do her very best to kill the woman.

Until then, she silently begged Bliss:

Save my son.

~~~

Calder and Andel sat on the benches of a rowboat, surrounded by Imperial Guards. Calder was having a hard time relaxing.

For one thing, the last time he’d been surrounded by the Guards, it had ended in a trial. The time before that, in an arrest. So he had some understandably unresolved issues. But he had a hard time imagining anyone comfortable surrounding by such a menagerie: one of the rowers had red-scaled arms with spikes protruding from the elbows. Another had the reverse-jointed legs of a lion, and furry ears high up on her head.

A thin, pale man in a Guard’s uniform stared endlessly at Calder, his eyes solid blue-white like a pair of full moons. A gaze like that could unnerve a Champion.

Andel leaned in, speaking quietly. The Guards could probably still hear him, but every little bit of secrecy helped. “We’re leaving as soon as we raise sails, right?”

“As soon as Naberius is onboard, yes.”

“I see. You want him to walk the plank. Old-fashioned, but I can see the appeal.”

A Guardswoman with a lashing tail glared at Andel, but the Quartermaster returned her gaze evenly.

“He wants us to go to the Gray Island and wait,” Calder said. “That’s where we want to go anyway. We’ve effectively received Imperial permission to do exactly what we wanted. Why complain?”

“Because he will inevitably see us all dead.”

“So long as he starts with you, I will consider myself the winner.”

The shadow of
The Testament
loomed over them, even as the Lyathatan’s shadow writhed beneath the water. The red-armed Guard looked over the edge and shuddered, backing deeper into the boat.

Well, it looked like Calder could do his share of intimidating.

Someone tossed a rope ladder down over the side, and Calder gripped it, pulling himself up the hull. “Is that you, Foster?” he called up.

The head that leaned over the edge was covered in quills.

“Ugh! I mean, ah, pleased to meet you, ma’am.” The porcupine-woman backed up, unamused. What was the Imperial Guard doing on his ship?

When he reached the deck, he realized there weren’t just a
few
Guards: the deck was crawling with red-and-black uniforms and mismatched body parts. He spotted Foster up in the crow’s nest, clutching a pair of muskets to his chest like a miser hoarding coins.

“What’s going on here, Foster?”

“You tell me, Captain!” Foster shouted back. “They tried to take my guns!”

“Not very hard,” one of the Guards muttered, crossing two pairs of arms.

Calder grabbed that man by the shoulder, stopping him. “Excuse me, Guardsman. What
is
going on here?”

“The future Emperor is boarding,” the Guard said simply. “We have to make sure this ship is secure.”

Imperial Guards—eternally paranoid. “He sailed here on this ship. If there were any danger onboard, surely he would know it by now.”

A lizard-tailed Guardsman pushed past, bending to examine a perfectly innocent coil of rope. “We’re acting on orders, Captain. If you have a problem, I suggest you take it up with Lord Clayborn directly.”

Andel had reached the deck by this point, and he looked no more pleased than Calder felt. And Calder didn’t get any happier when the rest of the Imperial Guards from the rowboat, which he had assumed were only escorts, climbed up the ladder after Andel.

Calder walked over to the edge, peering down. Only a single Guard remained in the boat, paddling back to
The Eternal.
A figure in a red suit emerged onto the deck, accompanied by a woman in red-and-black armor. If he was keeping the Head of the Imperial Guard with him, he must be paranoid indeed.

Since when had Naberius been this concerned with his own security? He had taken a number of risks in this voyage already, including boarding this ship with no more protection than his own Silent One. He hadn’t even seemed nervous sharing
The Testament
after he’d killed Tristania right in front of Calder. What did a man with such unassailable self-assurance need with an overwhelming number of Guards?

Mentally, Calder pushed the question away. The Imperial Guards were notoriously enthusiastic when it came to protecting the Emperor. Even the old Emperor, whom everyone had considered immortal, couldn’t go anywhere without Guards hovering over him. It must be worse for them when their charge was an ordinary mortal.

Calder walked over to his cabin, where a scaled Guard stood with thick arms folded. “Excuse me, Guardsman. That’s my cabin.”

“Please stay on the deck until our inspection has concluded.”

Spreading his empty hands, Calder smiled. “I just need to change my clothes, I promise I won’t delay you. This jacket has never fit well. Five minutes, and I’ll be a new man.”

The Guard’s eyes flicked over Calder’s shoulder as though looking for permission. After a moment, the man stepped aside. “Don’t linger. We’ll need all the crew on deck soon for inspection.”

What do they expect to find?
Calder wondered, shaking his head.

He stepped into the cabin and peeled his ill-fitting jacket off as soon as possible. If he never wore the tight, itchy thing again, it would be too soon.

He leaned over, flipping his clothes chest open. Ordinarily he could have just walked around without a jacket, but he suspected he would need every scrap of dignity and authority he could muster with Naberius and the Imperial Guard on his ship.

There was a girl in the chest.

Covered in a long black cloak, with white-blond hair spilling down her back, Bliss lay curled on top of his piled clothes. How had she packed herself in there?

While he was still staring in disbelief, Bliss rose, stretching, like a jack-in-the-box.

“You should invest in a more comfortable storage chest,” she suggested. “You never know when someone might need to stow away.”

Calder wasn’t sure why he was surprised. He should have expected something like this as soon as he heard that Bliss was on her way. “I try to discourage stowaways, actually.”

She raked her fingers through her hair, smoothing it out. “Why?”

“It’s...I’m sorry, I don’t have time to explain this. I need to return you to my mother.”

“I’ll go back to Alsa Grayweather at some point in the future, but for now, I expect she would want me here.” Bliss stepped carefully from the chest, one black boot at a time. When she was finally free, she began to stretch out her cramped legs. “She wanted me to tell you that we intercepted a void transmission from the Gray Island, shortly before the Children of the Dead Mother attacked you.”

Calder hadn’t been a member of the Blackwatch terribly long, though he suspected that if he
had,
then maybe he would have some idea what a ‘void transmission’ was. “I apologize, Bliss, but I don’t know what that means.”

“It means there is at least one member of the Sleepless in the care of the Consultants right now. And she contacted her comrades recently, which means she is likely still alive.”

She is likely still alive
.

He’d gone from certain his wife was dead to filled with painful hope in one night. This felt almost too good to be true, as though Bliss were setting him up for some huge disappointment. “How do you know it didn’t come from one of the Consultants?”

“Of all the Guilds who might work under the influence of the Elders, the Consultants are among the least likely. Especially on that island, where they enjoy a certain protection. And they are culturally disinclined as well, according to many leading scholars on the subject.”

Bliss had finished stretching. Now she was staring at the seamless wood beneath her. She prodded it with her foot, as though testing it to see if it would collapse.

“So you think it’s Jerri?” The Guild Head’s implication was clear, but he had to be sure.

“That’s the most probable scenario, though I also considered the idea that the Consultants are collecting Sleepless for some reason. That seems like somewhat of a timely coincidence, though, so I consider it less likely.” She sat down on the bed, her eyes now wandering over the cabin. “We rarely get to interrogate a member of the Sleepless. I would be interested in talking with your wife, should Jyrine survive.”

She said it innocently, but Calder made a mental note not to hand Jerri over to the Blackwatch under any circumstances. He would kill her himself before it came to that.

“I would also like to visit the Gray Island,” Bliss said. “I get the impression that several forces will soon converge there, and I should be present for the sake of observation. Naberius might not like it. Then again, he is not Emperor yet. Hm. Should I listen to his orders, I wonder?”

Calder shivered at the thought of Bliss under the Chronicler’s control. “Honestly, I’m not sure why anyone listens to him. Of all the people who could become Emperor, why
him?”