Chapter 4
The first thing Tarrin did when he woke up in the morning was talk to Jesmind. He didn't do it the night before because Jula said she was in a tiff, and he didn't want to talk to her when she was so angry. Waiting until morning had proven to be a bad choice. Her anger had only festered over the night, and when he did contact her in the morning, she absolutely let him have it. She raged at him for nearly half an hour, accusing him of everything from betraying her trust to throwing her away in favor of Kimmie, and doing so in a very derogatory manner. Calling him a "tail-chaser," a term for a male only interested in the female in front of him, was the least of the things she hurled at him over that period. Tarrin endured the tirade stoically, knowing that it was the fear talking in her, the fear that maybe he did favor Kimmie over her. Yelling at him was a way to see if he still wanted her, if he was willing to put up with all that and still want to be with her. In the end, after she yelled herself out, he calmly explained the emergency that kept him from contacting her, gave her a few moments to feel utterly foolish and embarrassed, then accepted the rather chagrined apology with a certain amount of dignity. He tried very hard not to laugh, and managed to hold out until after he broke contact with her.
All in all, it went rather well, he thought. It was a bit long, but the result was worth the wait. Jesmind felt a little foolish for going off the handle as she did, peace was restored to the family left behind in Suld, and what was more important, Tarrin established the fact that there may be days when he couldn't talk to her, because of fast-moving events or other problems that may arise. And if that did happen, he would contact her as soon as he could and explain what had caused him to miss the appointment. He decided to go around the table after that, as it were, talking to Jasana, Jula, Jenna, and Triana in turn, catching up on the little things that had little importance to anyone but him, matters of family. Jasana in particular had quite a lot to say, but most of it was about the Tower, about how the Keeper kept trying to be her friend, about this thing or that, this new doll or what happened the day before when she and Jula went down to get something to eat from the kitchens. Jula told him all about her lessons, how she was learning the spells of Weavespinner magic, and how she was learning more and more about joining the Weave. Jenna told him about the lessons from the other side, telling him that Jula was an excellent student, and seemed to have a particular knack for joining the Weave. Jula had a much more refined and dependable sense of the Weave in relation to the real world, able to find her way to physical locations through the Weave much better than Jenna could. Tarrin wasn't sure why, but then again, some Sorcerers had knacks for certain things. Like Tarrin's sensitivity to the whispers and echoes of the Weave, and Dolanna's trick of being able to weave blindly, and Dar's uncanny aptitude for Illusions. Jula had found her niche, her area of natural aptitude, and Tarrin was glad that she was developing it to the best of her ability.
Once that was out of the way, Tarrin and Allia sat together in Dolanna's cabin and waited for her to wake up. They passed the time playing stones as he told her more detailed stories of Var and Denai, eating the lunch that Keritanima's cooks brought to them, and waving off the day's lesson with Keritanima in favor of staying with Dolanna. After they got tired of stones, Tarrin brought in Sapphire and allowed the drake to get acquainted with Allia. Just like the males, Sapphire seemed to take an immediately liking to the Selani, and became nearly as sappy and adoring over her as Chopstick and Turnkey were.
Tarrin pondered again over Dolanna as Allia played with the drake, watching his friend sleep. Had the Goddess done this? She'd seemed so certain about things, about Dolanna trying Weavespinner magic, and what was more important, her crossing over with almost no difficulty. Tarrin had never seen such a look of concentration on Dolanna's face as he had last night. It was as if Dolanna knew exactly what to do, like she had studied and trained for the event all her life. And it had gone so smoothly for her. Tarrin knew that it had to be excruciatingly painful, but that didn't seem to bother Dolanna at all. That look of concentration had never wavered, not in the slightest. Spyder had said that the Goddess goaded any Sorcerer she felt was ready to try to cross over, forced the test upon them. Had the Goddess goaded Dolanna?
Spyder. Where was she? She had said she'd be back for another lesson, but then simply vanished. He hadn't seen her, and Jenna hadn't seen her. What happened to her? What had been so important that she abandoned Suld, abandoned protecting the Goddess herself, in their hour of greatest need? Whatever it was, it had to be something huge, something absolutely cataclysmic. That was what it would take to keep Tarrin from defending the Goddess. But Spyder was so old, so strange, so different. Maybe she didn't come because she didn't want to come, didn't help because she felt that they didn't need her help.
Then again, he remembered some of the things that he'd heard about Spyder. That she was the Guardian, the being responsible for defending the last gate into Sennadar. But they also called her the Aleax, a term that meant that she was some kind of direct mortal agent at the service of the Elder Gods. All the Elder Gods. Did one of the other Elder Gods usurp Spyder and send her on a mission? That was possible. She was also supposedly the assassin of the gods, a mortal sent to kill other mortals that committed some kind of hideous transgression against the gods. Or something like that. He'd only heard that story once, and it had been a very long time ago. Tarrin's memory wasn't the best in the world about things when he heard them when he was in a bad mood. Any one of those things could be the reason Spyder hadn't returned, hadn't continued the lessons or helped defend Suld or the Goddess. He figured he could ask the Goddess, but he had the feeling that any answer he did get wouldn't give him satisfaction.
"You're quiet, brother," Allia noted in Selani, getting distracted from the game of "flick Sapphire on the snout with a finger before getting bitten," and getting bitten as a reward for her inattention. She hissed and chided the drake in Selani, batting her on the side of the snout, but the drake looked entirely unashamed of her sneak attack.
"Just thinking about a few things," he replied. "That's all. You're bleeding."
"Your pet plays rough," she noted. "The price of looking away, I guess."
"She has a mouthful of very sharp little teeth, sister. You have to pay attention."
"I noticed."
The door opened, and Dar and Azakar looked in from the companionway. "Is Dolanna awake yet?" Azakar asked in his deep bass voice.
"Not yet, but she's stirred a couple of times," Tarrin replied. "She should be waking up soon."
Azakar nodded. "Do you want something from the galley? I'm on my way down there."
"Whatever they have laying around would be alright with me," Tarrin told him. "I missed lunch."
"I noticed," the Mahuut said. "Anything for you, Allia?"
"No thank you, Zak," she replied with a grateful nod. "I ate before coming to sit with Dolanna."
The pattern of Dolanna's breathing changed, a sure sign that she was either waking up or coming out of her deep, almost coma-like slumber. Tarrin's ears picked up and turned towards the bed behind him, and he turned and looked just in time to hear her sigh and see her open her dark, expressive eyes. "Well," she said in a weak voice, in Sharadi. "I should have expected to see you when I woke up."
"That's right," Tarrin told her. "What in the world made you decide to go and do that, Dolanna? You had to know what was going to happen!"
"That was why I did it," she replied unblinkingly. "I felt that if Keritanima could achieve a new level of power, when she doesn't have even a fraction of the training I do, I could do it as well. And I was right," she added with a tad bit of uncharacteristic smugness in her tone."
"Could you speak in some language I understand, Dolanna?" Dar asked.
"I am sorry, Dar," she called to him. "I only just awoke, and I tend to speak in my native language when not fully awake. As we all do."
"That's the truth. How do you feel?"
"Weak, tired, hungry, and very sleepy," she replied. "Could I trouble someone for a bite to eat and a glass of water?" she asked, moving to sit up.
"I wouldn't do that unless you're ready to compromise your modesty, Dolanna," Tarrin warned. "I put you in the bed, but I didn't dress you."
"So I feel," she said with a weary smile.
"I'll bring something for you, Dolanna," Azakar offered. "Would you like some hot spiced wine?"
"Please," she answered. "And a nightshirt, at the least."
"I'm afraid I can't help you there, Dolanna," Azakar said with a slight smile, then he left for the galley.
Dar glanced towards the Mahuut. "Uh, I'll go help him, so you have a chance to get dressed, Dolanna," Dar said.
"Thank you, Dar," she nodded, and he scurried after the huge dark-skinned Knight. Allia dug a nightgown out of Dolanna's chest, and the petite Sorceress pulled down her covers and sat up to allow Allia to help her into it fearlessly. Tarrin and Dolanna were too close, too strongly befriended for him to think of her as a human, and as such didn't even think of averting his eyes. Dolanna, who understood Tarrin better than anyone but probably Allia and Keritanima, showed no aversion to exposing herself to the Were-cat. Allia helped her into her nightgown as Tarrin propped up some pillows on the bed so she could sit up to eat, then they put her back into the bed and drew up her covers for her. "Such attention," she smiled. "I should play sick more often."
"You would have more if Keritanima was not using that magic mirror of hers to talk to that rabbit, Jervis," Allia said. "She has been speaking to him since before lunch, and I think she is still doing so."
Jervis was Keritanima's head of intelligence, and she talked to him quite often, either directly using that magic mirror or through reports. The Wikuni nobles had been up to something, and Keritanima had told Jervis to find out what it was. If she was still talking to him, he must have found out, and they were planning the counterstroke to deal with it.
"She has a large kingdom to manage, Allia," Dolanna said dismissively. "I am not disappointed that she is not here. I know she would be if she had the time."
"Probably," Tarrin agreed. "Alright, now tell me. How did you know what to do?"
"I did not," she admitted. "But I listened to Keritanima describe it, explain how it felt and seemed to her. I knew what to expect, and when it did begin, I realized what it was I had to do. It seemed as if I had done something I had known how to do since I was born, but had forgotten until that moment." Her eyes became distant a moment as she tapped her finger on her cheek in thought. "Perhaps Sorcerers have instincts concerning the magic, just as humans and Were-cats have instincts concerning the species," she proposed. "It is, after all, an innate ability. Something we possess from birth. Maybe a set of instincts concerning the magic comes with the power."
"Maybe," Tarrin agreed.
"It was, indescribable," she said in wonder. "That other place, we can return there again and again, can we not?"
"It's called the Heart," he told her. "And it's part of what I'll teach you about the change in your powers."
"I am starting to feel very left out," Allia said with a half-smile. "First my brother, then my sister, and now my mentor. You have done something I feel I will not do for many years."
"If you practiced more often, you would not be so far behind," Dolanna said accusingly.
"I can use my power, but I often do not see the need for it," she said dismissively. "Selani do not do what is not needful. When I need to use my power, I will use it. When I do not need to use my power, I will not."
"Practicing is a needful thing," Dolanna told her firmly. "With practice and study, Allia, you could become a very strong Sorceress. It is a crime to ignore your talent."
"I will not become dependent on my magic," Allia asserted.
"I am not asking you to do so. I am only asking that you live up to your full potential," Dolanna countered. "You have much potential, Allia. You are easily as strong as most katzh-dashi in the Tower."
"Let's save the arguing for another time," Tarrin interrupted.
"We are not arguing," Dolanna and Allia said in unison.
"Yes you are," he said bluntly. "It's the same argument you had with me, Dolanna, and it's the same argument you two have been having for the last two years. The only reason you're arguing out loud with Allia now is because you can't use it on me anymore. I think you two can go at least the rest of the day without fighting about it, can't you?"
"I will try, though seeing a great talent wasted burns at me," Dolanna said.
"I will not speak of the matter again today," Allia assured him.
"Good. Where is that food at?" he asked irritably.
After making sure that Dolanna ate a good hearty meal and he put her back to bed, Tarrin left her to sleep comfortably on her own and wandered back up on deck with Allia and Dar. Azakar still seemed uncomfortable around Tarrin, and he was starting to get a little annoyed at that. He needed to take Azakar aside and explain some things to him… this silly habit of trying to avoid him was getting old. It seemed worse that the Knight seemed capable of treating him courteously when necessary, but he wouldn't willingly spend time around the Were-cat. They waited a considerable amount of time for Keritanima to come out from her cabin, and when she finally did near sunset, she looked livid. Miranda and Szath trailed behind her a modest distance, a clear sign that Keritanima was furious. If even Miranda didn't want to get close to Keritanima, it had to be bad.
"What troubles you, sister?" Allia asked.
"I—You—They—Oooohhhhhhhh!!!" she growled in Selani, stamping a foot on the ground. "I'm going to kill all of them! I mean it this time!!!"
"What's wrong?" Tarrin asked.
"My father escaped from his insane asylum two weeks ago, and Jervis found out someone from one of the noble houses helped him!" she snapped hotly. "Now they're going to try to return him to the throne!"
"You should have killed him," Allia said in a calm tone.
"I wanted him to suffer for everything he did to me and our homeland," she growled in reply. "I can't believe that they did that! I made it a crime punishable by death with no trial if anyone aided my father!"
"Then punishing them will be a simple affair," Allia reasoned.
"I don't know which house did it!" she raged. "I know at least one house was involved, but even Jervis can't find out which one! And they can't find my father!"
"Someone has to have seen him," Tarrin said.
"Not yet," Keritanima grunted. "But the worse news is that I just can't leave Wikuna until I get this under control. If my father regains the throne while we're away, the ships that may be escorting us in the steamship may turn around and fire on us! It just won't be safe to do anything until I find my father and put him back in his cell."
"Kerri, we have a schedule," Tarrin reminded her.
"I know that!" she snapped at him in a very nasty tone.
"How can your father get back the throne if the Vendari support you?" Tarrin asked curiously.
"By force," she replied. "But the navy will be split over it, Tarrin, and we may end up with escorting ships loyal to my father. The last thing we need right now is a civil war in Wikuna."
"What are you going to do?"
"The simplest thing possible," she replied. "It starts and ends with my father. If I can get him, I can stop anything from happening before it goes too far. That's what it's going to take. I already have Jervis and his men taking the city apart looking for him, and they have orders to bring him in dead or alive."
"Dead would be the wiser choice," Tarrin told her.
"Oh, he's going to die now," she hissed. "Whether it's at the end of a musket or the end of a rope is the question. I spared his life once. I won't do it again." Keritanima was almost shivering with fury. "Excuse me, I think I'll go back to my cabin and throw things for a while," she said in a tightly controlled voice.
"Have fun," Tarrin told her, and the fox Wikuni stalked off in a tizzy.
They watched her leave. "Are you worried?" Allia asked curiously.
"Not really," Tarrin replied absently. "I have confidence in Kerri. She'll fix everything."
"Truly."
Dolanna was well enough to move by that evening, but she didn't reappear on deck until the next day. She looked as weak as he knew she felt. She sat down in a chair that Keritanima had brought up for her, and spent most of the day in it, watching the coastline of Wikuna drift in and out of sight on a cloudless, glorious summer day, or reading a book, or listening carefully and intently as Tarrin taught Keritanima more of the spells he'd learned from Spyder. Camara Tal drifted by occasionally to check on the Sorceress, and there was a stretch where the small Sorceress played hostess to all three drakes.
That day was full of mystery. Keritanima had some kind of plan, he realized when he looked her in the eyes, but she hadn't told him what it was yet. Phandebrass and Kimmie had disappeared again, and nobody on the ship could find them. Admiral Torm had even had the ship searched from crow's nest to the bilges, for his memory of what happened the last time those two had vanished for a long period of time was fresh in his mind. The last thing he wanted was for the white-haired Wizard to wander into the powder magazine and accidentally blow the ship sky high. But there was no sign of them. It created quite a stir on board, among the sailors as well as the passengers, and Tarrin pondered for quite a while about what happened to them, long enough to get curious about it himself. So around sunset, as the others went to dinner, Tarrin decided to track them down, or at least find where they had been last. He started at Phandebrass' cabin and then tracked the man's scent, which wasn't easy given its age and the number of scents both under and over it. But there was enough there to follow, even if he had to move very slowly to make sure he wasn't following an old trail, or lose the scent completely. Step by careful step, Tarrin crept along the companionway, up the stairs, out onto the deck, down the other set of stairs leading to the sailor's portion of the below deck area, and into the galley. Tarrin had to work around the cooks, who stared at him like he had lost his mind as he literally crawled along on all fours on the deck, following the scent trail carefully as it meandered around the galley. Kimmie's scent joined his at that point, and he gave up following Phandebrass' scent for following Kimmie's, for hers was a much different scent, and was much easier to follow. He followed the trail of both of them along a passageway and into one of the small holds near the bow of the ship, not far from the door marked with the large red letters that he knew was the powder magazine. Just knowing that Phandebrass was that close to the magazine made Tarrin's fur stand on end. The hold was one of the cargo holds, with four rows of stacked crates lashed to pinions nailed into the deck at regular intervals. There was no light in the hold, but the light coming in from the companionway was more than enough for Tarrin's light-sensitive eyes as he entered the hold in pursuit of Phandebrass and Kimmie.
This was where the mystery deepened. Their scents entered the hold, but they did not leave. Tarrin triple checked this fact, thinking that they may have tracked directly back over their own scents, but they had not. Tarrin followed their scents between two stacks of boxes, and then it simply stopped. He checked the boxes for their scent, then the walls, and even the low-beamed ceiling, thinking that maybe Phandebrass taught Kimmie some kind of spell that caused them to defy gravity. But there was no trace of their scents anywhere.
Tarrin realized that he'd done all that creeping about for nothing. Standing erect and muttering to himself, the wove together the Mind weave that would sweep out and locate any mind similar to his own, responding to the spell and revealing its location to him. Kimmie was a Were-cat, just like him, and he would get a response from her mind. And then the mystery deepened even more.
According to the spell, Kimmie could not be more than six or seven spans from where he stood. She was literally right on top of him, so close he should have heard her heart beating. How could this be? She was in the room, but she was nowhere to be found! There was no scent, no sight of her, but the spell wasn't woven wrong, and it couldn't lie. Kimmie was in the room. Somewhere.
Tarrin kept the spell going, moving towards it slowly, cautiously now as his suspicious mind began to consider the possibility of foul play. But he smelled no blood, and no Wikuni on the ship could hurt Kimmie. He stepped in the direction of the spell, having to climb over a stack of boxes and into another small pathway between where they were lashed to the deck, sensing the spell's information. According to the spell, he should be able to reach out and touch Kimmie. She was that close to him. But still, there was no sign of her.
Wait… not quite. He wasn't reading the spell correctly. Figuratively speaking, he was within reach of her, but his confusion over what he was sensing was keeping him from reading its outcome properly. In a figurative sense, he was within reach of Kimmie, but the spell said that she was below him. She wasn't right on top of him, he was on top of her!
He looked down at the deck. It was a standard stretch of deck, wooden boards, and he tried to remember if there was another deck below that one, or if it was the bilges.
That was when he saw it. It was a tiny speck of motion against the deck, up against one of the wooden crates lashed to the deck in the hold. It was a slight motion, like the movement of a small insect, but Tarrin's very sensitive eyes, which were extremely keyed to detecting motion, picked it up in the gloom. It was a strange motion, a rhythmic kind of swaying, and it was not a way that your standard insect moved. Tarrin split his attention to weave together a spell to create a small, softly glowing ball of light over this paw, and then he knelt and lowered it towards the motion.
He was almost bowled over. That tiny motion was Phandebrass!
He had shrunk himself! He was the size of a large bug, not even two fingers tall! And as soon as he lowered the light down, the indescribably minute form of Kimmie darted out from between two crates on the other side, jumping up and down and waving her arms frantically. She too was exceptionally tiny, so small that he couldn't even hear the sounds coming out of her mouth. Given that her lungs and her vocal chords were just as tiny as she was, it was no surprise he couldn't hear any sounds she made.
"What in the nine hells happened to you two?" he asked in a quiet tone, unsure whether a loud voice would hurt them.
Tarrin couldn't understand the response, but the sudden ugly look that Kimmie shot in Phandebrass' direction explained everything. He suppressed the urge to chuckle. "I take it you can't get back to normal?" he asked. Kimmie shook her head vigorously, pointing at Phandebrass with the claws on her paws out. That was not a good sign. Kimmie was livid, and he realized that he'd better do something to fix this before Kimmie lost her composure and decided to take her frustration out on her mentor. "Calm down," he told her, looking at her as he raised his awareness into the Weave, then stared down at her with eyes more attuned to magic than to light. He could see the spell, a Wizard spell, infusing the both of them, causing them to be the size they were. He could tell that, like most Wizard spells, it was operational only as long as it was intact. If he broke the spell, the magic that changed their sizes would be disrupted, and they would return to normal. Wizard magic was like that; where Transmutation was permanent—one of the very few forms of permanent magic a Sorcerer could employ—some transformation spells that were used in Wizardry were permanent only so long as the magic that fueled them was uninterrupted. This was probably one of them.
"I can break the spell," he told them. "Both of you, move out into the middle of the aisle." It took them a few moments to trek out into the center of the aisle, quite a walk for the two of them, and then Tarrin stood up and backed up step. He looked down at them, not looking at them, but at the magical spell that was causing them to be that size. He couldn't attack the spell directly—it was a different form of magic, after all—but he could attack the link that connected the spell to the source of its power, that other place from which Wizard magic flowed. Spyder had specifically taught him how to do it, how to defeat Wizard spells already cast as well as how to prevent them from casting any spells in the first place. He rose a little higher into the Weave, and once he felt comfortable, he exerted his will against it, causing the Weave itself to pull away from the Wizard spell causing the two of them to be so small. The spell seemed to shudder, resisting the removal of its power, and it actively tried to seek to reestablish that contact. But when the Weave was pulled away from it, the spell could not reach far enough to regain its power. It shuddered as the link it had with that other place was broken, and then the spell dissolved.
In a sudden shimmer, the two exceedingly tiny forms blurred, and then were replaced by two normal-sized figures. Tarrin returned his consciousness to the real world and stood up as Kimmie shook herself, almost as if she were shaking off water, and then glared at Phandebrass. "Don't ever do that to me again!" she shouted at him.
"I say, I have no idea what went wrong," Phandebrass said absently. "That's never happened before, it hasn't. The spell should have ended hours ago. I say, I've never seen a spell manage to hang on beyond its duration like that, I haven't. How odd. I really must study this!"
"Graaoooh!" Kimmie shouted, sounding like either an attempt to say something that ended in a growl, or a growl that tried to end in some kind of word. Whatever it was, it was certainly an unusual sound. Phandebrass ambled away, not even paying attention to either of them. "If I could duplicate the effect, I could make any spell permanent, I could! What a discovery! I say, I really must study this." He then pattered out of the hold, turning in the wrong direction and walking into a wall with an audible thud, before reappearing in the doorway going in the other direction.
"I'm going to kill him!" Kimmie raged, holding her paws out with claws extended. "I'll skin him and use his hide to upholster my chair!"
"Calm down, Kimmie," Tarrin said, then the situation got the best of him. Kimmie glared death at him as he began to laugh helplessly, so hard he actually got tears in his eyes. "How long were you stuck like that?" he managed to ask.
"All day!" Kimmie replied in a furious tone. "We thought about trying to get up on deck, but then I realized that someone would come looking for us, and our scent trails ended in here. You almost stepped on me, Tarrin!" she accused.
"I couldn't see you," he told her.
"How did you find us?" she asked. "Once you got in here, that is."
"I used a spell to locate you. It took me a while to make sense of what it was telling me, though. I couldn't see what it was saying, because I didn't think it was possible." He suppressed the urge to laugh again. "While I was trying to make sense of it, I saw Phandebrass moving."
"At least he was good for something!" Kimmie hissed.
"You looked cute like that, Kimmie. Almost like a little doll," he teased.
"Oh, shut up!" she snapped at him, then stalked out of the room with his laughter chasing her.
Kimmie didn't speak to Phandebrass until they reached Wikuna, but the mage probably never noticed. He spent the next two days with his nose buried in this book or that, trying to discover the reason why the spell didn't expire when it was supposed to do so. The two days that they traveled went by quickly for Tarrin, as he continued his lessons with Camara Tal and also trained Keritanima in Weavespinner magic. He had a new pupil now, and Dolanna watched on, even taking notes in a blank book she had gotten from somewhere as he showed Keritanima new spells, and taught her more and more about joining the Weave and using it for various tasks.
It started getting apparent that they were close to their destination early in the morning on the third day, as Tarrin got up before dawn and decided to walk around to watch the sunrise. The sailors were all on deck, tacking to the wind and executing a turn that would bring them on a heading for the mainland. All the sailors seemed a little anxious but excited, probably happy that another voyage was about to come to a peaceful and unexciting end. The only time a true sailor was happier than when he put out to sea was when he was about to come into port. The drinking and the carousing and the ladies were all waiting for them at port, and that was almost as exciting as the open sea for a sailor. Tarrin moved towards the bow as the sun came up behind them, illuminating a coastline that was getting closer and closer, and the first signs that they were approaching a city were becoming apparent. He could see towers and a large coastal fortress.
And he saw smoke.
Tarrin peered into the gloom, unsure of what he was seeing. He waited long moments as the light became brighter and brighter, and then, when the edge of the sun began coming over the horizon, illuminating the sky above the land before traveling down to touch the land itself, he was sure of it. There were three distinct columns of thick smoke rising up from a very large city. One was coming from deep in the city, one was coming from the docks, and the third was coming from just behind one of the coastal fortresses that stood on a rise just before the shallow, bay-like harbor of the city, on the south side. There were three of those fortresses, one on each side of the island that split the entrance of the harbor, and the third that stood on the island itself. They'd built walls out from the island and sides facing it to narrow those entrances even more, making getting into the harbor while being attacked by the cannons in those fortresses a very risky proposition.
This was serious. One column of smoke, Tarrin would explain away as a fire. But three? That was no coincidence. Keritanima said that the noble houses were up to something… this could quite possibly be it. Tarrin wasn't the only one to notice the smoke, as the sailors stopped chattering animatedly and became more sober, more grim. They all stopped what they were doing and paused to stare at the smoke, and they were probably thinking the same thing that Tarrin was thinking. What was going on?
Torm began shouting orders at the men in Wikuni, and Tarrin, who was now completely fluent in Wikuni, could understand them. He rode them about having a voyage to complete, and they'd find out what was going on when they got there, and to get back to work. They did so, but now there was a jerkiness to their usually smooth actions, as they tried to watch the smoke and do their jobs at the same time. One Wikuni, a dog-like Wikuni, nearly fell out of the rigging in his inattention to his duties.
They sailed closer and closer, and the ships surrounding the Queen's ship tightened their formation, moving into a much more defensive posture. The sun rose from the eastern horizon and cast the morning light on the city before them, which seemed almost ominous now. Tarrin's suspicious nature automatically assumed the worst, that this was indeed some kind of attempt by the nobility to dethrone Keritanima. It didn't seem to make much sense to him, though. The Vendari supported Keritanima, and that literally meant that there was no way they were going to take the throne from her. They couldn't defeat the Vendari, not even if they had all the Wikuni on their side. So why cause trouble? They must realize that the Vendari were just going to march out and crush them!
Tarrin blinked, shifting his thinking from the big picture to the core of the matter. He remembered what Keritanima said about her father and the danger he posed, that it started and ended with him. Well, the same could be said of Keritanima. If the nobility could kill her, they wouldn't have to fight the Vendari for the throne. If they already had Damon Eram, Keritanima's father, and they killed Keritanima, they could just trot him out and let him reclaim his throne. Then things could go back to the way they wanted them.
Tarrin held out an arm, stopping a sailor in his tracks as he rushed towards the lines running from the bowsprit. "I think you should go wake up her Majesty," Tarrin told the Wikuni seriously, a short ferret-like Wikuni with a long, narrow snout and a pink button-nose on the end. "Tell her to come see me, and don't take no for an answer."
"Me, wake up her Majesty?" the man said in a nervous, high-pitched, nasal tone. "I don't have a deathwish!"
"You can get killed by her for waking her up, or you can be killed by me for not obeying me," Tarrin said in an ominous tone, showing the Wikuni his claws in a very direct manner. "Make your choice."
The man blanched at the sight of those claws, which were nearly as long as the Wikuni's fingers, then nodded emphatically. "Go wake up her Majesty, yes sir! I'll go right now!"
"Do that," Tarrin growled, feeling his feral instincts rise up even at the same time that his need to assert his dominance strengthened. The little rodent rushed away, literally running for the stairs below decks, and Tarrin gave him no more mind as he turned back towards the coast, watching the smoke carefully.
Keritanima, Miranda, and Szath joined him several moments later, and Tarrin didn't really have to say anything to her. Keritanima took one look at the smoke, and her eyes flashed dangerously. "I'll have someone's head for this," she growled in a deadly tone.
"I'm sure they want yours too," Tarrin told her. "Did Jervis say anything about this?"
"No, he didn't," she replied. "But I'll go find out what's going on from him right now," she announced. "Stay here, Miranda. If you see anything happening, come tell me."
"Alright," Miranda acknowledged as Keritanima and Szath hurried back to her cabin.
Tarrin and Miranda watched the smoke as they approached, getting closer and closer to the city. They watched in relative silence, only answering questions as the others came up on deck after realizing that something was going on. Camara Tal, who had a background in military matters, seemed to understand the danger immediately. "If they took that fortress, they're going to fire on us as we pass it," she told them, pointing to the approaching fort standing on the rise over the inlet to the harbor.
That made things more nervous, and they waited in almost grim anticipation as they got within what he thought was the range of the fortress. And there was no firing. They got closer and closer, then passed by it as they entered the harbor, and still no firing. They were close enough to see that the smoke was coming from the back of the fortress, but on the outside. Someone had indeed assaulted the fortress during the night, but they had been repelled. That made Tarrin breathe a sigh of relief.
They pulled in to the quay with no difficulty, a quay where a very large complement of Vendari warriors and three carriages were waiting for them. As soon as the hawsers were tied down, the Vendari warriors marched out and flanked where the gangplank would be lowered.
Tarrin, still standing at the bow, stopped worrying about the situation long enough to look at the capital city of Wikuna. It was indeed a very large city, bigger than Suld, and its buildings were made of wattle-and daub or red brick. Occasionally, there was a building made of wood, and the larger buildings were made of a strange stone that looked like whitewash. Those were the new buildings, the old ones were obviously made with defense in mind, large, ominous constructions of gray stone interspersed with the newer, less war-minded buildings. There were more old buildings than new, but the old buildings seemed to blur together with one another and making the new buildings stand out. In the center of the city was a hint of gold, and when he looked closely he saw that it was some kind of building that stood higher than the others, with some sort of gold-painted face that made it stand out. They drifted into the harbor, forced to enter the harbor single-file with half of the escorting ships ahead and half behind, which was jam packed with ships and wharves extending out into the dark water. Some of those crane-like constructions he remembered from Den Gauche were also here, loading and unloading huge amounts of cargo from ships with their ropes and their nets. The formation around them opened to let the Royal ship out, dropping anchors and letting Keritanima's ship pass. They then turned towards the far side of the harbor, moving towards an empty wharf at the extreme southern side of the harbor, the wharf closest to the coastal fortress they had passed. The ship drifted in, threw out its lines, and men on the dock tied them to huge hawsers on the dock. The quay to which they had tied themselves was made of stone also, but it was the strangest stone he had ever seen. They were made of long, long blocks of it, cut thin, and it didn't look like any stone he had ever seen. He didn't see any Wikuni close by, but then again, they had landed at what had to be a private wharf, with no buildings standing at the end of it as they did for the wharves he could see further down the line. There were Wikuni on those other wharves, dock workers loading or unloading ships, sailors on the ships themselves or moving to or from them, and well-dressed men and women standing at the feet of the docks or among the workers, either supervising or observing them. This was the strength of the Wikuni, the trade and commerce that financed their massive fleets, and Tarrin paused to watch it in action. Sapphire flapped up from the side of the ship and landed on his shoulder, and he petted her absently as he watched the mighty Wikuni economy in operation, going on despite the smoke rising from the north side of the harbor, just behind the buildings facing the water, and the smoke rising from the coastal fortress and the area deep inside the city's heart.
Keritanima gathered them all together, and then they left the ship quickly and without ceremony. She didn't explain what was going on, and Tarrin couldn't tell if she was happy or angry as she got in the first carriage with Miranda. Tarrin squeezed into the second carriage with Allia, Kimmie, and Camara Tal, and Dar, Dolanna, Phandebrass, and Azakar packed into the last one. The carriage had lavish cushions, covered with red velvet, but the roof was way too close to his head. He banged his head into that roof more than once as he tried to scrunch his legs so Camara Tal, who sat opposite him, would have enough room for her own. The carriage was never designed for such a large person. Tarrin only wondered how much fun Azakar was having in the other carriage.
"I wonder what's going on," Camara Tal speculated. "Kerri looked mad enough to bite the hooves off a horse."
"I think something happened last night concerning her father," Tarrin replied. "Something certainly happened, that's for sure."
"Since that fortress didn't open up on us, I guess Kerri's forces won that fight," Camara Tal reasoned.
"I hate Wikuni politics," Kimmie grunted. "They're so murky."
"As clear as pitch," Tarrin agreed.
"The core of the matter is Keritanima," Allia said. "We need that ship she can give us, and we cannot use it if she does not have the throne."
"That's the short of it there," Camara Tal agreed, patting Sapphire on the flank when the little drake jumped onto her lap.
Tarrin had to duck down to look out the window, as they traveled up streets made of either cobblestone, brick, or that same strange white stone that he'd seen on the docks, stone laid down in such large blocks that it must have taken ten horses to pull the wagon carrying it. Some of them were as wide as the street itself! The streets paved with that white stone were perfectly flat and smooth, very easy to disseminate from the rough cobblestone or brick streets they traveled. How did they get such huge blocks of stone to the street and make it so flat? There were many Wikuni on the street, going about their daily business, pausing to watch the procession pass by as small children chased after the carriages and the Vendari escorting it. They were dressed very much like they dressed in the West, dresses, doublets, tunics, and breeches. The architecture was also similar to Sulasian or Shacèan architecture, so much so that if they'd put humans on the streets instead of Wikuni, he would have thought he was still on Sennadar. The city smelled a lot better than any city he'd ever been in; the putrid miasma of garbage, waste, and decay that permeated the cities he'd visited was very much reduced here. There was still hints of it, but all in all, it had to be the cleanest city he'd ever visited. There weren't piles of trash lining the streets as there were in other cities. The streets were clean and neat, and people filed to and fro in an orderly fashion. Wikuni wearing blue uniforms of some sort stood on a raised podium in the center of the busiest intersections, blowing a whistle and directing the many wagons that passed him by on the two crossing streets with hand gestures.
As cities went, Wikuna was impressive. Not for its size or its wealth, but for its orderly appearance. Everything was clean, efficient, and well maintained. People didn't stagger down the streets drunk—at least not where they were now—and everything seemed to be organized. Sulasia could take some serious lessons from the Wikuni about how to run a city.
They turned a corner, and after banging his head against the ceiling for the fifth time, Tarrin irritably leaned down as far as he could and put his head out the window to gaze up at the Royal Palace. It stood within a large ornate fence, where Wikuni wearing the red uniforms of the military stood with muskets to their shoulders in defense of the main gate. The Wikuni crest was on the gate, seemed to have been inlaid directly into the gate to become a part of it, a lion and a dragon done in etched silver facing one another across a brass chevron. Tarrin looked at the dragon on the crest and then looked at Sapphire on Camara Tal's lap, and he saw the similarities immediately. Sapphire was a perfect replica of a dragon, though she was much, much smaller. Tarrin looked past the fence and to the palace itself. It was absolutely massive, but it was not a castle-like building, as he always imagined it would appear. It looked more like some kind of immense mansion, obviously hundreds and hundreds of years old, with a massive dome made of what looked like gold rising up from its center. Tarrin realized that it was the same gold building he'd seen while approaching on the ship, since it stood on a hill in the center of the city, stood at the highest point in the city. It was a truly immense building, much larger than any one family would ever need, but Tarrin knew that it was much more than that. It also served as a central hub of the Wikuni government, populated by servants, courtiers, messengers, politicians, and the men and women that made the Wikuni system work. It was a testament to the position of monarch, not the monarch him or herself, the home of this or that noble family that happened to hold the throne at any one time for over a thousand years.
The carriages went around the building, to a side entrance, and then they stopped. The Vendari marched off towards the back of the huge building as an absolute horde of servants rushed out of a pair of elaborately decorated double doors, two of them unrolling a red carpet out to Keritanima's carriage, which had stopped directly in front of the doors. Tarrin recognized Jervis as one of the Wikuni at the front of that procession, in his dumpy waistcoat that had the gold chain hanging from the pocket of the vest he wore beneath it, looking as frumpy and innocently harmless as ever. Tarrin opened the door of his carriage as Keritanima was helped out of her own, ignoring the hot looks from the Wikuni coachmen, one of which was trying to tell him in broken Sulasian to wait in the coach until the Queen was inside. Tarrin snorted and waved a paw negligibly at the Wikuni, then stepped down onto Wikuni soil and padded towards Keritanima as all the servants bowed or curtsied to her. All the servants and courtiers looked at Tarrin with looks of shock on their faces, either at his appearance or the fact that he wasn't obeying the commonly understood protocols and customs that surrounded dealing with the Wikuni monarch.
"Tarrin, you're supposed to wait in your carriage!" Keritanima admonished him.
"Make me," he replied bluntly.
"Don't embarrass me here!" she hissed at him in Selani. "I am a Queen, if you don't recall!"
"Then you should have gotten me a carriage large enough to keep me from banging my head on the ceiling," he replied. "If I banged my head one more time, I was going to break a hole in the ceiling."
Keritanima looked at him, then chuckled. "Alright, I think we can fling in the face of tradition this one time," she conceded. "Jervis, I'm sure you remember Tarrin."
"Of course," he replied in his nasal voice. "You weren't quite so tall the last time we met, Tarrin."
"Just wait another two years, Jervis. You'll be surprised."
The rabbit Wikuni looked at him, then grinned in a mischievous manner. "I have little doubt," he agreed. "I really must complain to you about how you changed our little princess here. When she came back home, she was completely different. She caused no end of trouble for us."
"That's my sister," Tarrin said without blinking. "If she wasn't causing trouble, I'd think she was sick or something."
"Tarrin!" Keritanima protested in a petulant tone. "Do you have anything to report, Jervis?"
"Quite a bit, actually, but it's best left for the council chamber, your Majesty," he said with a slightly smug smile.
"Is it good news?"
"It is excellent news, your Majesty."
"Then let's get to it as soon as we see to the comfort of my guests," she said. "Bring them in and give them the best rooms you can find," she told the chamberlain.
"Of course, your Majesty. Only the best," he said with a deep bow.
"Alright then. Let's stop standing around out here," she called.
Tarrin was led into the cavernous building after the chamberlain gave sharp commands to the servants as to where the guests would be staying. Sapphire fluttered up and landed on his shoulder to the surprise of the small bear Wikuni, a rotund female, that was leading him. She wore the livery of the Palace servants, with the lion and dragon crest emblazoned on the front of her black maid's dress. She led him along hallway after hallway, all of them carpeted and with painting and tapestries and stands and tables holding sculptures or suits of armor or racks with ceremonial weapons hanging from them. The lavishness of the interior was as obvious as the exterior, everything about the place trying to overwhelm the visitor with the wealth and power of the Wikuni empire. Tarrin wasn't very impressed by things and objects—except works of beautiful art—mainly because he could make anything he wanted. It was strength and personal power and ability that Tarrin respected, not titles or wealth or ancestry. The Palace, to him, was a gaudily overdecorated waste of space that was mildly interesting to look at, but was ultimately a hollow thing trying to intimidate rather than impress or please. The whole place had a coldness about it, a sense that those objects displayed were a collection of booty rather than an attempt to please the eye, and the sense of the place was one of ruthlessness, mirroring those who had lived, worked, and plotted within the confines of the building.
There was no soul in the place. That was what it was. It lacked that sense of soul that many old buildings possessed, a warmth of welcome. In fact, the place seemed hostile, somehow, as if the souls of all those who had met their end in this place, or whose ends were manufactured by the scheming that was rampant here, were trapped inside the building, screaming out their fury and despair for any who would take the time to listen to them. It did not feel like a home; it felt more like some kind of military fortress, grim and foreboding, or maybe even a mausoleum. Tarrin did not like this Palace, not a bit, and it was all he could do not to tell Keritanima that he was going to stay out in the city until it was time to leave.
The room to which Tarrin was shown was suitably stupendous. It obviously was a very special kind of room reserved for the most distinguished guests, and he felt lost within it inside two seconds. It was just as over-decorated as the passageways, every finger of wall covered by paintings, tapestries, or shields displaying crests or coat-of-arms, and there were many dainty stands and tables holding strange abstract sculptures that consisted of strange asymmetrical or geometric shapes, bizarre art that teased at the back of his mind. The floor was covered by a massive blue rug that took up the entirety of the floor, thick and shaggy, and Tarrin's claws caught on it no less than three times as he moved through that first room. It was an apartment, a cluster of five rooms with entry only through that first room, furnished with chairs and couches and resembling a parlor. Beyond it was another sitting room, obviously meant for the private use of the occupant, with only a single couch and a pair of cushioned chairs surrounding a low table set before a large fireplace. There were three doors leading from that room. One went to a large bathroom with a tub made of stone set on a pedestal of sorts, and some strange stone-like objects for which Tarrin had no description. One resembled a washstand on a narrow pedestal, with strange knobs flanking an obvious spigot, all done in brass polished to a brilliant shine. One vaguely resembled a seat, but it was actually a bowl filled with water, with a small lever set against the side. Tarrin looked at it in curiosity, then recalled the descriptions that Keritanima had given him of the Palace, and the technological advances of her people. The basin-like thing was a sink, and the small knobs would allow running water to flow from the spigot, a place to wash his face or paws. The bowl was a toilet, something like a privy that stood alone, and it too had running water. If he flipped the handle, water would flow into the bowl and carry away the waste down a drain. The tub too had handles and a spigot looming over one end, so that the bathtub could be filled. He looked down into it, and saw a hole in the bottom where the water drained out, as well as a small piece of cork that was meant to be placed into the hole to stop it up and allow the tub to fill up.
The second door, the one directly across from the door leading into the outer parlor, opened into a grand bedroom, filled with all sorts of furniture. The bed itself was absolutely monstrous, more than large enough to fit his tall frame, a full four-poster bed with curtains drawn around it. There were dresser chests and armoires and footchests and chairs scattered throughout the room, more than enough to hold enough clothes for ten people and seat five, and there was a large oval mirror that had to be nine spans high and five spans across at its widest point. It was set directly into the wall. The room had a large window filled with many panes of very clear, well-made glass, and the morning sun was streaming into it, casting sunbeams down onto another thick, shaggy, softly cushioning blue carpet. That room had two smaller rooms leading off each side of it, and he realized that they were closets, places to store even more clothing, or gear.
The third door from the inner parlor led into what had to be some kind of working room. It had a large desk squarely in the center of it, and there were strange rectangular pieces of furniture behind it that had many drawers. He opened them, and found them to be too small for clothing. He opened them randomly until he found one that was stocked with many neat pieces of paper. The desk also had drawers on one side, and one of them held an inkpot and writing quills. The desk had an oil lamp atop it, for the room had no windows. At least that room had no carpet, only a wooden floor that was polished until it nearly shined.
Tarrin wandered back into the outer parlor, feeling a little lost. It was way too much space. He would really only use one room, and occasionally use the room with the bathtub in it. What was he supposed to do with the others? He'd have to go through two rooms just to get to the two he intended to use.
Sapphire flew around the apartment a little while, then landed on his shoulder and barked her displeasure with the arrangements. "I completely agree," he told her absently. "I'm not even sure if I can open that window for you."
She chirped a few times, a sound that he had learned meant that she was hungry or thirsty. He Conjured a bowl, then went into the bathing room and held it under the spigot in the sink. He turned one of the knobs gently, and he was surprised and a little impressed when clean, clear water poured forth from it. Running water! How did they make it pour out of the pipes like that? They had to have something pushing the water, but what? He'd have to ask Keritanima. He set the bowl on the table in the inner parlor, then Conjured Sapphire a few large chunks of raw mutton on a large platter. Sapphire seemed to really like mutton. She landed on the table, her claws scratching up the highly polished finish of the top of the table, and started eating.
Tarrin watched her eat for a few moments, then wandered back into the bedroom and looked out the window. They were on the fourth floor, overlooking the east side of the city, towards the harbor. He could see the harbor clearly, since nothing impeded the view from the Palace, see the many Wikuni clippers and rakers, the smaller, shallow-draft ships they used for short-distance trade or defense. Keritanima had talked about the rakers, just as she had described the clippers, fast, maneuverable ships that could engage ships much larger than itself because it was very hard to hit. They also had one of their massive battleships in the harbor, a ship that looked vaguely like a galleon, but was nearly three times larger. They were largest ships afloat, three hundred spans long and a hundred spans wide at amidships, with five masts. Its side had three rows of gunport after gunport, making coming to broadside against a ship like that absolute suicide. The battleships were slow, but that much concentrated firepower in one place made its speed a moot point.
He glanced into the inner parlor, seeing that Sapphire was still eating. So many advancements. Gunpowder, running water, cast iron, steam engines, pens that carried their own ink, those strange huge stones that were set into the quay and the road. The Wikuni were indeed far ahead of the West, even further ahead of kingdoms like Yar Arak. He realized that if the Wikuni ever went to war with the rest of the world, they would actually stand a good chance of winning. They ruled the oceans, and could land whenever and wherever they pleased. Their homeland was untouchable, allowing them to strike at any place and at any time of their choosing. It would not be a war in the traditional sense, he knew. The Wikuni weren't really interested in anything but trade, but if there was a war, they would strangle seaborne trade, sink anything not Wikuni afloat, and slowly choke off the trade that enriched all nations. But it wouldn't come to a war, because the Wikuni were traders, and war was bad for business. No nation on Sennadar with the exception of Zakkar had any issues with the Wikuni, and the Zakkites had shown over the hundred years that they had been skirmishing with the Wikuni at sea that they couldn't defeat the mighty Wikuna Navy.
They were much different from the humans, and yet they were not. The Wikuni weren't human, but they had based their society around things that humans would easily understand. It was almost as if they had copied the humans somehow, and then realized that they could do it better. Maybe because where the many types of humans fought with one another, the Wikuni were united, working towards a common purpose. If the humans weren't so busy tearing down one another's cities, if they would actually work together, maybe they too could prosper as much as the Wikuni had.
Sapphire flapped over and landed on his shoulder, and she looked out the window as well. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do now. Were they going to come for him when Keritanima was ready? She was the queen here, and that meant that she couldn't act the same way she did when they were more or less alone. She had her image to protect. He'd already seen that it was going to make her act differently. The rooms were nice, but they were… uncomfortable. Too grand, too large, and too sterile. They didn't tell him that he couldn't leave the rooms, and he realized that he really didn't want to wait in them.
"Want to get out of here?" he asked Sapphire. She chirped emphatically, agreeing with him, and then he nodded and turned around. "Alright then, let's go look around."
He left the apartment, and started to wander aimlessly through the halls of the Wikuni Palace. It was as grand everywhere as it had been in the parts he had seen, almost garishly and lavishly decorated with art or displays from all over the world. They even had a strange suit of armor that looked to be made of wicker, of all things. He'd never seen anything like it before, but the sword at the belt of that display told him that it was armor from the Far East, since it looked much like his own sword. The same gentle curve, and after drawing it, he saw that it had the same chisel tip and elegantly constructed blade. It was much smaller than his sword, meant for a human to wield it in either one or two hands, where his own was obviously meant to be a two-handed weapon for a human. He replaced the sword carefully and continued on, wandering up and down staircases, passing many Wikuni in the hallways, and looking into any open doors that he encountered, but never leaving the passageways. The Wikuni he passed were from everything between the two opposites of Wikuni society. He passed servants in their livery, and also occasionally passed a rough-dressed Wikuni that had to be a common worker or peasant, in the Palace for some unknown reason. To a man, every Wikuni that looked as if he didn't belong in the Palace was awestruck at it, and also looked terrified to be there. He also passed any number of haughty, richly dressed Wikuni men and woman in their outrageously expensive clothes, jewels dripping from them like water, and haughty, almost sneering expressions that said that they believed that they were about ten rungs up the ladder over everyone else. Tarrin didn't like nobles, because his concept of respect and power were diametrically opposed to what they though respect and power were supposed to be. He found the lot of them to be arrogant and weak, and those two traits were very dangerous ones when combined in the face of a Were-cat. Were-cats respected strength and wisdom, and those were traits that few nobles had in any abundance.
But the nobles he passed in the halls didn't bother him overmuch. They stared up at him in curiosity, as he could tell that they were trying to decide if he was some strange kind of Wikuni or not. They also stared at the drake on his shoulder with open greed, obviously considering his companion to be some kind of exotic pet. One Wikuni lady, a wolf Wikuni wearing a gown with a neckline low enough to leave little to the imagination, even went so far as to try to buy Sapphire from him, using badly mangled, broken Sulasian to do so. They didn't think he knew Wikuni, and in a moment of cunning, he realized that that could be an advantage, so he played along with her. He declined her offer, and then managed to meander around until he found a door that led outside.
The door opened into a garden of sorts, not as large or grand as the one in the Tower, but still rather nice. It had gravel paths around clusters of small trees or carefully laid out patterns of different colored flowers, and there was a strange place in the middle that had no flowers at all, but rather six very large stones seemingly randomly dropped in an area of sand that was carefully combed so that the lines made by the rake swirled around the stones and filled the voids between them. The designs in the sand were abstract, but he could tell that they had some kind of meaning. Tarrin squatted down at the edge of the sand, surrounded by strange bricks that were molded into semicircles that formed a border with the sand, finger tapping on his chin as he studied the designs in the sand and tried to puzzle out the hidden meaning concealed there.
"I never realized you had the soul of an artist, Tarrin," Miranda's voice reached him. He looked up and saw her walking towards him, and to his surprise, she had an old friend marching behind her. Sisska looked just as he remembered, with her boxy snout and her black eyes, wearing the kilt and the leather bandolier over her torso. She carried her axe negligently in one hand, a large weapon against which few could stand. Tarrin stood up and took Sisska's scaled, clawed hand when she reached him, genuinely happy to see her.
"Her Majesty said you had grown. She did not exaggerate," Sisska said by way of greeting.
"You're looking well, Sisska," he told her. "How are your eggs?"
"They are in the keeping of the clan, as is proper," she replied. "Raising the hatchlings is a task of the clan, not of the parents. They will be raised in the Vendari tradition."
"Well, it's good to have you back. I didn't like Szath very much."
"He is a fine warrior, with much honor."
"He's also as smart as a box of rocks," Tarrin grunted. "I think the only reason he's still alive is because he is so big and powerful."
"Such things do not matter as much to us as they do to you," she told him with a level gaze.
"I guess not. Is Binter here too?"
"He defends the Queen."
"I take it you came out here for a reason?" he asked Miranda.
"Do I need a reason to come out into the garden?"
"When I'm here, I'd say yes," he replied.
She gave him her cheeky grin. "Actually, Kerri's looking for you. I figured you'd find your way out here, so I decided to save the messenger that would come find you from a very bad experience."
"You're so considerate," he said dryly.
"When did the dragon-kin come to be with you, Tarrin?" Sisska asked.
"On the journey from Suld," he replied. "I'll tell you about it while we're walking."
Tarrin told Sisska about what happened with the drake as Miranda led them along the halls of the Palace. Sisska seemed impressed by that, and he just had to ask why. "There are drakes in Vendaka," she replied. "They are colored gold, however. It is a very high honor if a drake befriends you, Tarrin. Drakes are creatures of honor and dignity, and they do not choose their companions lightly."
"Then how do you explain Chopstick and Turnkey?"
"They chose wisely," Sisska said adamantly. "I did not have much time to come to know the mage Phandebrass, but from what I have heard, he has a good heart and a kind soul. Do not let what you see on the outside cloud the truth within, Tarrin. It is a bad practice."
Tarrin nodded in agreement. He happened to agree with her. Phandebrass may seem a little odd, but he was actually a good friend and a good person. "Maybe they saw what was there when nobody else did," he offered.
"Drakes know," she said simply.
Miranda led him to a huge hall deep in the bowels of the Palace, a huge place with buntings hanging from vaulted walls, a domed ceiling from which hung several chandeliers, and at the far end was a raised platform about two spans high. It had a huge throne on it, and a banner with the crest of Wikuna hung from the wall behind it. Keritanima sat on that throne, wearing her royal robes, and the large numbers of Wikuni nobles gathered in the hall told him that this was a formal audience. Tarrin looked around, and saw the Vendari lining the walls, as well as a complement of armed Wikuni that surrounded the dais; those had to be the Royal Guard he'd heard about. Binter and Azakar stood at either side and slightly behind the throne, ready to defend the Royal Person from any attack. Binter had that massive, ugly war hammer with him, the head of it on the floor between his feet and the handle propped lightly with one hand. Keritanima looked almost smug on that throne, and as Miranda led him closer, through the crowd of nobles, to the front, he saw why.
There was a Wikuni chained by the wrists kneeling at the front of the crowd, that was a respectable distance from the prisoner, flanked by two Royal Guardsmen who both had swords drawn. He was a tall Wikuni, a lion, but his fur was scraggly and dirty and there was some dried blood in his mane. He wore a red waistcoat and black trousers, and they were dirty, bloody, and rather the worse for wear. Tarrin looked at him and realized that this was Damon Eram, Keritanima's father, and the cause of a lot of irritation she'd felt as they came into the city. Keritanima had been talking when they came in, asking Damon Eram who had helped him escape.
"I had no help, traitor," he spat. "A crazy man couldn't escape from there, but a sane man could easily."
"Your mental condition went out the window the minute you tried to lead an armed party into the south fort and take it over, father," she said coldly. "You could be as sane as a cold stone right now, and it wouldn't help you. The punishment for treason doesn't make any allowances."
"Treason? Me?" he screamed. "You were the one that used your foul magic to make everything think I was crazy! You're the one that bull-rushed the noble houses into dethroning me! But I know that they're not very happy with that decision now, witch!" he laughed. "If I would have taken over that fort and sunk your ship, they wouldn't have executed me for assassination, they would have put the rightful king back on the throne!"
"You engineered your own destruction, father, not me," Keritanima said with flashing eyes. "Your need to punish me unhinged you. I can see now that it was a temporary insanity. Fortunately for me, your act of treason has made any kind of contest for the throne a moot point. You have committed high treason against the crown, father," she said in a nasty voice. "If you would have made a legal challenge, I'm sure you would have had a decent chance of abdicating me and regaining the throne, and I would have honored a legal decision without a fight. Doesn't it eat at you, father?" she said in a teasing tone. "To know that if you'd not bowed to your anger, again, you would have probably regained the crown? That temper of yours cost you the throne, and now it's going to cost you a whole lot more."
"Don't play with me, witch. Just be done with it," he hissed.
"Before I do that, I think you deserve to know who it was that turned on you, father," she said with a bright grin. "I don't want you to go on to your final reward without knowing the truth. Shan," she called.
Tarrin looked as a door opened on the side, and a Royal Guardsman escorted a young female Wikuni into the hall. She was a mink Wikuni, like Miranda, but her features were much sharper, and her eyes looked haunted. Tarrin remembered the description of this woman; this was Jenawalani, one of Keritanima's sisters.
"Jenawalani!" Damon Eram shouted angrily. "You did this? Two of my daughters betraying me?"
"I'm not a traitor," Jenawalani said in a haughty tone. "I'm the Baroness of Wildwater. I'm not an Eram anymore, and I'm not your daughter anymore. I am loyal to my Queen."
"Of anyone on this earth, I'd have thought you would be the last to side with Keritanima!"
"Things change, Damon," Jenawalani said calmly, crossing her arms between her breasts. "I'll never be Queen. I made a vow. And I knew that if you got back the throne, the first thing you'd do is have me killed to keep your plot a secret, or to keep me from trying to do to you what you did to Sabakimara. I'm doing nothing more than what you were going to do to me. I just did it first."
"You witch!" Damon Eram raged at her. "I'll make sure you don't survive to enjoy your victory, Jenawalani!"
"You can't touch me, father," Jenawalani hissed at him. "I knew everything, and I told Keritanima everything. I told her that House Bell was the one that freed you, and them and House Koramon were the ones behind the attacks. After all, I was right there in your planning sessions, wasn't I?" she added with a little smirk.
Damon Eram glared viciously at the mink.
"So you see, Damon, you are of absolutely no more use to me," Keritanima told him coldly. "House Bell and Koramon have both already been punished for what they did. I hear that there's nobody left." That explained to Tarrin why there were three plumes of smoke. While Damon Eram, House Bell, and House Koramon were attacking the south fort, Keritanima's forces were attacking their home bases. "In gratitude for Jenawalani's faithful service, I'm giving her all the assets of House Bell and House Koramon and granting her a noble charter. She's the matron of a new noble house, father, the house Chan, which, I'll admit, probably has more material worth than house Eram now. So in the end, you get nothing, and the children of the house of Eram prosper. I'm the queen, Veranika will be the matron of House Eram as soon as she finishes school, and Jenawalani will be the new matron of House Chan. And you get an unmarked grave."
Damon Eram gave out an indecipherable shout, and then struggled against his chains.
"You're the one who taught us the value of betrayal, father," Jenawalani said viciously. "You taught us well, didn't you?"
Damon Eram spat in Jenawalani's direction.
"Temper, temper," Keritanima teased. "I hereby decree that since you were caught in the act of high treason, that there is no need for trial. Do the noble houses assembled acclimate this fact?" There was a rumble of agreement. "Good. So, as being found guilty of high treason by acclimation of the noble houses and decree of the crown, I hereby sentence you to death by hanging, to be carried out immediately. Furthermore, your body will be buried in an unmarked grave, so that not even your body can be found to serve as a reminder of what you once were. It's a criminal's fate, father. Perfect for you, given what you did to our kingdom while you occupied the throne. Take him away," she commanded.
Screaming and kicking, Damon Eram was dragged from the audience hall, and there was silence as his screams died away. "Well then, now that that's settled, I'd like all of you to greet Jenawalani Chan, the new matron of the new noble house of Chan. Welcome back, sister," Keritanima said with a mysterious smile.
"It's good to be home, your Majesty, though I'll miss Wildwater," she replied with a nod.
"What just happened, Miranda?" Tarrin asked quietly.
"Well, I'll just elaborate on what you just saw," she replied as Keritanima read something a servant handed to her, and the nobles swarmed around Jenawalani. "When Keritanima took the throne, she forced her sisters to vow to abdicate their titles and never be queen. Instead of turning them out, Kerri gave Jenawalani a small barony in a remote part of our kingdom and sent Veranika to a merchant's school so she could be the matron of House Eram. Well, from what I've heard so far, Mardal Koramon and Pleris Bell concocted a scheme to free Damon Eram and overthrow Kerri, and they enlisted the aid of Jenawalani, because she was a princess. She knows a lot of things that many nobles don't, about the Palace and the way things work where the nobles can't see them. Instead of siding with them, however, she accepted their offer and then immediately contacted Jervis. Jervis didn't tell Kerri what he was doing, because he wanted her reactions to be genuine, and that was important to keep house Bell and house Koramon believing that Kerri didn't know what they were up to. Jenawalani told Jervis everything, and Jervis arranged the little trap that caught Kerri's father earlier today."
"I thought Jenawalani hated Kerri," Tarrin said.
"She did, but I think she realized that she was safer with Kerri on the throne than her father. You heard what she said, and she was right. Damon wouldn't have blinked when he would have ordered his daughter killed. He assassinated Sabakimara, his eldest daughter, though everyone believed that Jenawalani did it."
"He killed his own daughter?" Tarrin gasped.
"Without shedding a tear," Miranda said bluntly. "Because she was getting to be too dangerous. Damon Eram took the throne by killing his own father. He didn't want history to repeat itself."
Tarrin was shocked. Damon Eram was absolutely heartless! If there was ever a man that deserved to die, it was Damon Eram. "And people call me a monster," Tarrin declared.
"There are monsters, and then there are monsters, Tarrin. Now I'm sure you understand completely why Kerri ran away."
He did. "Completely," he agreed. "Hanging isn't good enough for him. I wonder if Kerri would let me do it."
"No, in our society, being hanged is a criminal's death," she told him. "When Kerri ordered him hanged, she was taking away any shred of what little honor Damon Eram had or may have had with the nobles. He's going to die a criminal, not a king."
"That's suitable," Tarrin said with a nod. "The man deserves far worse, though."
"Pain wouldn't have mattered to him," she said. "This is the best way. Trust me."
"It matters to me."
"You're a savage," she teased.
"Then I'm a savage."
"Well, that about settles that," Miranda said with a smile. "Now that Keritanima's destroyed two noble houses for treason, both of them very rich and powerful, the rest won't even think of trying. In just a little bit, the only man in Wikuna that could challenge her throne will be buried in an unmarked grave. Kerri has the Vendari as allies, and Jenawalani's house, which is probably fourth or fifth in the new line of influence, will be just one of the top four or five houses that are Keritanima's allies. I'd say that Kerri's position is now totally secure."
"Good. Then nothing's standing in our way now."
"Not a thing," Miranda said with a cheeky grin. "At least from this side. Out there on the ocean, though, who's to say what's going to get in our way?"