The Gate Thief

14



LOYALTY


Keel was as loyal a servant as a king could have, or so it seemed to everyone but himself. But Keel knew that it was mere coincidence that created that illusion.

In his twenties, he had been called Plank, because he was master of refitting of the King’s ships. His own father trained him to the task, for he was Plank son of Plank son of Plank, three generations of master shipwrights, who could heal a damaged ship and make it whole again.

Unlike his father, who was a grumbler and griper, Keel-when-he-was-still-Plank had never uttered a word of complaint. After the war with Gray ended badly, and the treaty forbade Iceway to have more than six small fighting ships, suited only for subduing pirates, Plank never criticized the treaty, nor said a word against King Prayard’s father for having started and then lost the war.

Instead, he quietly set about repairing all the ships that managed to limp home from the war. Five of the smallest and fastest he refitted for speed, to skim lightly across the water in pursuit of pirates.

The others—the great warships—he refitted so that even the most suspicious inspectors from Gray would see nothing but cargo vessels, suitable only for trade, ships that wallowed in the water, sluggishly lurching from port to port.

When Prayard became king, he came himself to see what Plank had done. He stood on a tower overlooking the harbor and watched the clumsy cargo vessels that once had been proud warships, as they bumbled up the Graybourn to the docks, or yawed their awkward way downstream, barely manageable from the helm. Prayard did not complain, either. “You have kept my father’s word,” he said to Plank. “It is a good servant who preserves the King’s honor.”

“I am the King’s true servant,” said Plank. Then, most softly, he said, “Return at night and see my obedience.”

Five days later, Plank was wakened by the hand of his youngest son, Knot. “A visitor who has no name,” said his son, and Plank knew it had to be the King.

No word was spoken, and only the most shaded lamp was used, casting a tiny bar of light whenever Plank raised the shield. He led his hooded visitor onto the most sluggish of the former warships. He dismissed the watch and took the King down into the belly of the ship, one deck above the bilge.

Then Plank lifted a hatch, handed the lantern to the King, and plunged down into the bilgewater. Rats squealed and scurried, but Plank paid them no attention. “Cast the beam here,” he said softly.

The King raised the shield and aimed the beam at Plank’s hands. Plank gripped a lever that was snugged up under a deck joist and pulled it toward himself, moving it through an arc that was one-eighth of a circle. Where the lever had been invisible, now it was plain to see.

“What does it do?” asked the King softly.

“This lever is attached to a baffle under the hull. When the lever is parallel with the joist, the baffle is extended. It catches the water and makes the ship move slowly and awkwardly. It’s a home for barnacles. But at sea, far from shore”—he did not say, Far from the observing eyes of the Grayfolk—“a captain could send a trusted mate down into the bilge, to wade his way along the whole length of the keel, turning all these levers one-eighth of a circle, and then the baffles are drawn up snug against the bottom.”

The King nodded. He was a seamage. He understood that this would make the ship move much more smoothly through the water. The sailcloth, with its load of barnacles, would still be a drag on the ship, but it could be managed now.

“But the mate must be careful,” Plank continued. “For if he turns the levers forward instead of aft, the baffles are completely released and fall away from the ship, leaving the hull smooth and clean. That would be a tragic accident, for the ship would then move as swiftly and surely as a warship, and some might think that the treaty had been violated.”

“An awkward design,” said the King softly. “What madman would think of such a thing?”

“I fear it was my own invention, sir. I’m glad the King will never know how clumsily I obeyed his command.”

“You must be sure to acquaint every captain of this mechanism, and make sure they know which way to turn the lever,” said the King. “We would not want to find ourselves, quite by accident, with a war fleet of a hundred ships, where the treaty binds us to no more than five fighting vessels.”

“On your advice, sir, I will train the captains,” said Plank.

Every time a ship came into port, Plank would send his divers down to replace the sailcloth in the baffles, and to make sure the mechanisms worked smoothly. But only those divers saw how the baffles were made, and only the captains of the ships understood how the mechanisms were controlled.

It was up to the King to decide how large a crew these wallowing merchantmen would carry, and how well the men might have been trained for war.

Two years later, when Plank’s overseer, the steward of the royal factories, retired, it was Plank, and not the man’s own son, who was appointed to the post. “Because you serve me so loyally,” said Prayard, “doing for the King what the King cannot even think to ask.”

That was how Plank became Keel, master of shipyards, wagonyards, smithies, road graders, armorers, and all other manufactories that served the royal will. As Keel, he did all that the King expected, preparing Iceway to be constantly ready for war while seeming to be committed to peace, and keeping the secret of it from all but a handful of the men who labored under him.

But the deepest secret of all was this: Keel was not loyal to the King at all.

Keel was loyal to Iceway. Not to the rocks and canyons, the fertile mountain valleys fed by icy streams, the great fjords that cut their way into the bitter coast, the islands where Icewegians kept their trading posts and fishing villages.

Keel was loyal to the people, one by one and all together, the nation of Iceway. As long as the King acted in the interest of the Icewegians, Keel obeyed and served. But if the King betrayed them, Keel did what was right for the survival and the freedom of the Icefolk.

That’s why, as Plank, he had never shown the levers to King Prayard’s father, for he was the man who had lost the war and betrayed Iceway with a humiliating treaty. Prayard, though, seemed to Keel to act in the interest of the people, and so he showed him the fleet that was ready for his use, should he choose to use it.

But King Prayard did not use the fleet. He was grateful enough—Keel’s advancement to a place of greater trust and authority, not to mention wealth and status, was proof of that. But the King did not use the hidden warfleet. He stayed married to the Birdbrain of Gray, the useless Bexoi. He allowed the men of Gray to strut through the streets of Kamesham unkilled, he allowed the ambassador and his spies to have the run of the castle Nassassa without a taste of poison or the cold bite of a dagger in the ear.

King Prayard did not suspect that Keel was the center of a plot to kill Queen Bexoi and assassinate every Grayman in Iceway, because Keel was careful with his plans. No one understood the whole plan; no one knew any part but his own.

It was to have begun with the poisoning of Bexoi, but the nightcook of that time, the woman Hull, discovered the plan and blocked it. Keel arranged for her to die that night, and began again. He knew of a much more foolish plan to murder Bexoi outright, one that originated among the Graymen; he was content to have the bitch from Gray be murdered by the hands of Gray. But that plot, too, was blocked, though this time Keel did not know how.

A third time he planned, and this time he understood that King Prayard himself would have to die. But not before his concubine, Anonoei, and her two sons were safely out of Nassassa and hidden where no one from Gray could find them.

That was when Anonoei, in the midst of preparing for a journey she had only learned about that morning, simply disappeared, along with her sons.

Keel understood then that even plans that no one knew about were somehow known. There was a manmage in the castle, he realized. Someone who could peer into the thoughts of his heart—or someone’s thoughts, someone’s heart.

Ever since the disappearance of Anonoei, Keel had bided his time, making no new plans, watching to see who it was who had kidnapped or murdered Anonoei and her boys.

He had watched as Bexoi gave birth to a darling child that everyone loved, hailing the brat as true heir, even though Bexoi was no mage and the child would surely be drekka, or weak if he was a mage after all. He had watched as Prayard trotted Bexoi out before all the people, and they began to love her instead of hating her as the symbol of their enslavement to Gray.

He had rejoiced when that baby died, accidentally smothered by a pillow in his bed; the nurse who had been careless was promptly killed. Keel would not have lifted a finger to save her—fools deserve whatever comes to them—but at the same time he was glad of her foolishness.

But that same day, there had been a flurry of activity among the palace guards, some business about rappelling down the face of the cliff below the castle and bringing out—dead—some squatters who had apparently been living in some of the ancient caves. How the squatters had got there, and how they had been supplied with food, no one explained, and when Keel set out to learn more, he found that all the guards who had been involved in the operation were gone. Sent away the same day. It was very strange, and Keel did not like it when he did not know what was going on in Nassassa.

He made no complaint at being kept ignorant; indeed, he never showed interest in anything but his own duty. He was the perfect servant, the embodiment of loyal service to the King. But with Queen Bexoi so pregnant that she seemed about to burst with the next baby—the next heir whose succession to the throne would mean Gray’s perpetual domination of Iceway—Keel knew that it was time to act, and perhaps not subtly this time.

What stayed his hand was the knowledge that he did not know enough. He still did not understand how the earlier plots had been detected and blocked. These days Queen Bexoi took great care never to be alone.

Prayard also had her well guarded, too many guards at once. One man could be enlisted, another man bribed—but five? Six? Someone would blab or boast. Keel had to find another way to kill her.

Perhaps it would be enough to kill the King himself. What could Bexoi do, with her child unborn?

It was too uncertain, though, for Keel to feel ready to act. Too many things could go wrong. Gray might leap into action, using the death of Prayard as a pretext to seize power. Keel’s war against Gray might die before it had well begun. There was no point in creating chaos, if he was not prepared to turn it into a strong new order that would regain Iceway’s freedom and power.

If only Anonoei had not been taken. If only one of her sons were still alive. Someone to be a focal point for Icewegian patriots. Keel would not be regent himself, but it would be someone that he trusted—perhaps even Anonoei. Since she was no mage at all, and a compliant woman, she would be easy to guide.

But she was gone, and so were her sons. It was a terrible time for those who loved Iceway. If only King Prayard were a better king, and not the doting lover of that Sparrowgirl Bexoi.

It was one of Keel’s talents that he could conduct his ordinary business while plotting his plots; he did not have to talk his plans out with anyone, nor did he need to draw maps or doodle words and notes. He seemed to others to be busy all the time; they did not know what was going on behind his eyes.

His meeting with the heads of two quarreling merchant families ended—he had almost, but not quite, grabbed them by the hair and banged their foolish heads together. They were both young, too young for so much responsibility. Only men who were old enough for their temper to be cool were fit to lead in matters of commerce.

Or revolution. Or war. Sometimes Keel even wondered if he was still too young.

It hardly mattered. Since none of his plans worked out, he would be old soon enough. Maybe he needed to be more hotheaded, and not so careful.

Then again, hotheads were quickly caught and killed. Keel got where he was by being methodical and silent.

As he was silent now, alone in his small office overlooking the armory yard. He strode to the window and looked out over the hum of activity. He knew the purpose of every man and woman who crossed the yard, knew what was in every wagon, what was being forged by every fire.

“Do not turn from the window. Do not show any sign that you are not alone.”

It was a woman’s voice. He knew the voice. It was Anonoei.

But he did not turn. If she was alive, if she was here, then something powerful and dangerous was going on.

So he said nothing, did not turn. He waited.

“Now, as if you were weary of watching, close the shutter, my old friend.”

Wordlessly—for he did not want anyone below to glance up and see his lips moving, and thus conclude that he was not alone—he closed the shutters and then turned.

There she stood, looking exactly as she had the morning when he told her to pack for herself and her sons, only the smallest bag of the least clothes, only what she needed for two days. Instead the foolish woman had made a big production of packing a trunk, and someone must have seen, must have said what she was doing, and so she had been taken.

But she was still beautiful. Still warm and comforting in the way she looked at every man. As so many times before, Keel thought: I can see why the King loves this woman.

He certainly forgot her quickly enough when she was gone.

“I’m sorry I could not send you word before now,” she said softly.

“I feared that you were dead.”

“So did I, sometimes,” said Anonoei. “And other times I wished that I could die. But now I am glad to be alive, and glad of my friends. Are you my friend?”

Keel shook his head. “I am the loyal servant of—”

“Oh, my dear, my dear old friend,” said Anonoei, “I know what you are the loyal servant of.”

“Who?” he asked.

“Some say you serve only your own career. Some say you serve the factories as once you served the shipyards. Some say you serve your family’s ambitions. Some say you serve the King like his faithful dog.”

“Dogs turn on their masters; when the master falls, when he dies, the dog will drink his blood and tear his flesh.”

“Always a cheerful man,” said Anonoei. “I know you serve something higher than your own career, higher than your family, higher than the King. I know that you are loyal to Iceway.”

“Are you going to pretend that you share this loyalty?” asked Keel.

“Are you going to ask where I have been?” asked Anonoei.

“No,” said Keel. “If you don’t want me to know, then your answer would be a lie; if you want me to know, you’ll tell me without my asking.”

“My loyalty is to my children,” said Anonoei, “but thanks to a trusted friend, they are now safe, in a place where no one can find them, let alone harm them.”

“One might suppose that you are saying they are dead,” said Keel.

“Not dead. Very much alive, and ready to inherit the kingdom, if the need for that arises. But I hope it does not arise.”

Keel wasn’t sure how to hear her words. With anyone else, he would assume that it was all a sham—that she was telling the truth by denying it. But there was something about her that made him think she might be honest.

“You hope the Sparrow Queen’s wombling will take their place?”

“Those sons were born from love, not ambition,” said Anonoei. “I think they will be happier not to be kings, or to be used by those who want to make them kings. But if they’re needed, they’re alive and safe. I thought you should know.”

“It was kind of you to tell me,” said Keel. He let the tone of his voice say, If that’s all, then go away.

“You’re an amazing fellow, Keel. A woman that you thought was dead shows up in your cell and you seem utterly unsurprised.”

“If I showed what I feel then all men would know my heart,” said Keel.

“Instead, only I do.”

“Your new friend is a gatemage,” said Keel. “Or else you could not have entered this place. Be careful—gatemages have a way of running afoul of the Gate Thief and losing all their magery. You wouldn’t want to be stranded somewhere inaccessible. I hope your boys are in a place they can walk away from, when the gates are gone.”

Anonoei smiled a thin but pleasant smile. Keel was a clever man. He knew what the smile had to mean.

“The liar told you that he was the Gate Thief, didn’t he? Don’t you know that gatemages can never tell the truth? It’s against their nature.”

“Let’s talk about what we’re going to do now,” said Anonoei.

There was nothing overtly sexual or even ironic in her tone, and yet “what we’re going to do now” made Keel’s thoughts suddenly turn to the rumpled bed in the corner of the room.

“Not now,” said Anonoei, as if she had read his thoughts. It seemed some women could always read such thoughts, when men had them. Or perhaps men always had such thoughts, so it took no great cleverness to read them. “I know you plan to kill the King, but I wish that you would not.”

“You do me no favor to say that,” said Keel. “I have no such plan.”

“That was your plan when you told me to pack. I obeyed you, but made it obvious enough that surely someone would notice me and tell the King, so he could prevent my going.”

“Did he?”

“Someone else did,” said Anonoei. “I will not let you kill the King.”

Keel shrugged. “Since I do not plan to do this awful crime,” he began.

Then he found himself outside the door of his room. He had not moved, or rather, he had made no effort to move. Yet he had been inside the room, and now he was outside it.

The door opened. “Come in,” said Anonoei. “Do you believe me now when I say that you will not kill anyone I tell you not to kill?”

“So you’re a mage after all,” said Keel, reentering the room.

“Am I?”

“Or that gatemage friend of yours is listening, sending me here and there at your command.”

“Oh, no one commands him, dear Keel. You have the magery of iron. It does what you command, your machinery never needs oiling, your iron never rusts. That is what you do.”

“And what do you do?” asked Keel.

She reached out and touched his hand.

All at once his body filled with a bright longing for her to wrap her arms around him.

And then, just as quickly, she shifted her hand and he felt himself to be unworthy of her love. He did not want her to embrace him, he wanted her to overlook him entirely.

She took his hand between both her hands and all those feelings fled. Now between them there was only a deep, abiding friendship. The most important friendship of their lives.

“Manmage,” he whispered.

“I did not want you to think I was untalented,” she said. “Or that my sons were only half-mages by their birth.”

“How can I trust anything I think or feel or decide, if you can make me swing from one longing to another in a moment?”

“Don’t base your decision on how you feel,” she said. “You never have; why start now? I came to you because you’re the steady one. You chose your loyalty and never wavered. I have no desire to change that loyalty—only to explain why your perfect loyalty should lead you to another course of action.”

“Another?” asked Keel. “I have no course of action, so I can hardly change it.”

“I will not attempt to control your decision,” said Anonoei, “but do remember how useless it is for you to try to lie to me. You’re a subtle man, Keel, and you tell your secrets to no one but me.”

“I have no secrets.”

“It will not be good for Iceway if King Prayard dies. Yes, my sons are alive, but I will not bring them back until they’re old enough to stand up for themselves. This is a bad time for the chaos of a dead king without an heir, or with only an unborn baby to inherit. The jarlingmoot will insist on electing an adult as king, breaking the line. But there’s no one ready to stand as king. Not even you.”

He knew that she was right.

“I want Queen Bexoi’s baby to be born alive,” said Anonoei. “It’s good for Iceway if Gray believes that a half-Gray child is next in line for Iceway’s throne.”

Because she was communicating with him at levels deeper than speech, he understood exactly what she meant. “You think the child can be controlled?”

“I think the mother means to kill the King herself and rule Iceway through him.”

“And you think this is a reason to allow the sparrowbitch to live?”

“I think this is a reason to keep the King away from her.”

“I’ll take her to an island far from here and strand her on the shore—will that do?”

“She would burn the ship to the waterline before she’d let it take her anywhere,” said Anonoei.

“A firemage,” said Keel. “Not a Feathergirl.”

“A Firemaster at least,” said Anonoei. “And so powerful she can make a clant that bleeds.”

Now Keel understood why Luvix had been so sure that he had killed Bexoi.

“I should have guessed it,” said Keel.

“No one else did,” said Anonoei.

“Except you,” said Keel.

“I don’t guess,” said Anonoei. “You must be more patient than you have been so far.”

“What if I choose to ignore your warning?”

“Then I’ll find someone else to help me,” said Anonoei, “and you can watch the people suffer as you destroy Iceway. As I said, my loyalty is not to Iceway, though our plans can help each other if you choose.”

“What do you want me to do?” said Keel, believing her but also knowing that his belief was probably the result of her magery.

“Give me time,” she said. “Give me a chance to go work my plans in Gray. Let me shape events so Gray’s ambitious heir grows impatient with his father. Let it be Gray that collapses in chaos, while Bexoi is here, nursing and protecting her second son. Let’s see whether her motherly love is stronger than her ambition. Either she’ll stay here and remain safe, or she’ll go—and leave her son behind.”

Keel did not have to say all that immediately came into his mind. That Anonoei wanted Bexoi’s son, and not one of her own, to be the pawn in the game of succession. That if Bexoi left her child behind, the child would be under Keel’s control. That if she took the child with her, King Prayard would be without an heir if something happened to Bexoi and the boy. That if she remained here in Nassassa, under Prayard’s protection, then Anonoei would have a free hand to work whatever mischief she and her gatemage friend might be planning for Gray.

It was a much better plan than anything that had been within Keel’s power.

“I wish I could trust my approval of your plan,” said Keel.

“I’m not that strong a manmage,” said Anonoei. “I can’t make you want what you do not want. I can’t make you fear what you do not fear. I can’t make you think of what you do not already know.”

“Then what can you do?”

“I can work on weak-minded people who don’t know what they want, who aren’t smart enough to fear what they should fear, and who think they know already what they do not know. That’s the drawback of manmagery—all our forced servants are weak and dull. So I come to you, not to be my servant, but to be my friend and ally.”

Keel thought of how, at a touch, she had made him want her.

But he must have shown on his face that he was thinking of this, because she shook her head. “I did not make you feel what you did not feel,” she said. “I made you aware of what you had always felt.”

And he knew that it was true. That all the time the King had loved Anonoei, Keel had also longed for her. He had such self-control that he had concealed his desire even from himself. But it was always there.

“Let’s be clear on one point,” said Anonoei. “I know you have that desire, and I am specifically not exploiting it. Whatever you do, you must do it in the full knowledge that I will never be yours. I have all the sons I need and want, and all the husbands, too. Do you understand?”

It was as if she had erected a wall of ice inside his loins. “I do not act for such reasons,” he said.

“That’s why you’re worth dealing with,” she said. “You’re good at what you do, and I am good at what I do, each within our limitations. Mage against mage, neither of us is a match for Bexoi. Perhaps no one is in all the world. But we won’t stand against her. In fact, we will stand with her, protecting her, protecting her son. As long as she and that boy are alive, Gray will be torn apart by conflicting ambitions. And by her choices, she will reveal herself and expose herself and, in the end, betray herself.”

“You have a plan far deeper than the one you’re telling me,” said Keel.

“And you will have plans within plans. But know this: I keep my word. I know that you keep yours. So if you promise me that you will act together with me, then I know that you’ll be my ally until you give me fair notice that our pact is over.”

“Yes,” said Keel. “You understand me well enough, and I make that pact. I will not take the King’s life. I will protect Bexoi and her baby. I will give you time to work your workings in Gray.”

Anonoei smiled. “I always knew you were the natural king of Iceway. Because only you act for the good of all, and not just for your family or your own ambition.”

“I have no ambition.”

“You have the large ambition of a patriot,” said Anonoei. She took him by the shoulders and kissed him on the mouth—not a woman’s kiss, but the kiss of a sister, a friend. “Count on me, and I will count on you.”

And then her hands were not on his shoulders, her breath not on his cheek. She was gone from the room, vanished in an instant. Her gatemage had taken her.

And Keel was left there alone with the deep longing for her that had never caused him pain before, because he had not known that it was there. He would die for her, kill for her. He loved her more than he loved his wife or his children, more than he loved his own life. More than he loved Iceway.

If only she would use her power to take this powerful desire away from him.

Yet if he lost that desire, who would he be? What would be in his heart then, if she were gone from it?