The Pirate's Lady

Chapter Six



Rillen sat in his chambers, the sultry night air thick with the scent of the trees below wafting up in a heady, sticky cloud to choke him with sweetness. The lamp behind him wavered in a snatch of breeze, flicked bronze shadows across the bare stucco walls, and then steadied as he read the note.

Have found Van Gast’s weakness, and his secret name—Andor. Will have him outside Herjan’s temple, tomorrow at sunset. I will be there to identify him.

Outside Herjan’s temple—how apt. Where Haban had kept his stall where he’d taken possession of the stolen diamond from Van Gast. Haban’s niece was doing very well so far. Rillen had to hope that Van Gast’s famous little-magics didn’t have the chance to save him. No, not hope, plan for it.

Van Gast’s secret name too—that was worth knowing, storing away for future use. A rack guarded their true name with their lives, thinking any who knew it knew them well enough to know all.

The door opened without any preamble, no knock or call. Rillen leaped to his feet, outraged and ready to berate whoever had startled him into dropping the note, sending his twisting plans awry in his head.

He stopped the instant he saw the mage in the doorway, hunched and monstrous on a platter of cushions held by two bonded slaves. Rillen’s mind went utterly blank for a heartbeat, except for one thought, clanging in his head like a death-bell. Kyr save me, he’s come to bond me.

The slaves brought the mage in, set him on the floor next to a low lounger and table where Rillen entertained visitors, or would if he had any he wished to entertain. The musty, dead smell of Remoria filled the room, overpowering even the cloying flowers floating up from the avenue, sticking in Rillen’s throat, twisting round his heart.

With all the casualness he could muster, Rillen sat on the lounger and faced the mage, but he couldn’t hide the subtle shake of his fingers. The slaves fussed over the mage a moment and then slid into the background, just furniture, for all the thought and emotion behind their eyes. Useful furniture, who did for the mage those things he could not, for fear of cracking crystals, losing power. Rillen studied the crystals rather than think about bonds, or why the mage was here, considered the eyes that hid in sparkling depths. The center mage, the one who led them. Bissan.

“Your father,” Bissan murmured, “intends to…not betray us, but to try to enslave us. To use us.”

The mage had brains behind those crystals then. Still, Rillen had best be cautious for now. “What makes you say so?”

The mage laughed, a little breath that whistled among the crags around his lips. “Not everyone but you is stupid, Rillen. We do not wish to be used, by anyone, and most especially not someone so…so limited as your father. We might be happy to ally, a true partnership. With the right person.”

Rillen tried to still the sudden burst of heartbeats, the swirl of new thoughts and plans that crushed into his head. Kyr’s mercy, if he had just one mage at his back, he could rule Estovan and the lands for leagues around. With three…he could control everything worth having.

Bissan watched him as these thoughts flashed across his mind like cannon shot, a vague smile flickering on his lips as though he knew what Rillen was thinking.

“Your father is foolish in this, though sharp in many other ways. He trades well, runs the city adequately. We require more than that, a man with flair. Who knows we can’t be enslaved.” Again, a hint of a smile, a subtle curve of a lip half-hidden. “It’s we who enslave. But not you, Rillen. We’ve learned that much. Unbonded men can go where we cannot, see what we cannot, yet. In return, we have much to offer you.”

“I see.” Rillen saw a lot possible that wasn’t before. The western coast at the mercy of Estovan, him at its head, his hands running with gold. Old Toady dead and Van Gast to blame for it, if his plans went well.

“I think—” the mage said. “No, I know that we want the same things. I’ll help you, Rillen, if you’ll help me.”

Rillen shut his eyes briefly to try to still the sudden thunder in his ears. “What help do you want?”

The mage shifted almost imperceptibly. A crystal flaked off by his chin and Rillen watched transfixed as it fell, see-sawing through the sultry air to land with a small blue spark on the tiles.

“You know more than you told your father. Tell me all you know, and I’ll help you kill him.”

* * *

Van Gast paced up and down on the violently green rug Guld had found to brighten his quarters on the Glass Dagger. Somehow it made Van Gast feel better. His mind was racing with possibilities, with questions he couldn’t answer with any surety. As always, it was almost impossible to know what Josie was thinking, what she was planning.

Josie was here for a little light robbery and revenge, Skrymir had said. Revenge against who? Him? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe she’d forgiven him, and maybe not. She’d seemed…different, but hers was the twistiest mind he’d ever known. She wasn’t planning revenge on him, she wanted his help. She’d said she’d wanted his help for a twist, a twist like he wouldn’t believe. He was sure that was the truth behind the game. If he knew where she’d berthed, where to find her, he’d have gone there quick as a hunting shark. Snuck into her quarters and persuaded her back into his bed, the way he did best.

But Guld had yet to find the old Ghost, Van’s ship that she’d stolen, and Van Gast’d had no more luck himself out on the streets. The ship wasn’t berthed in any of Josie’s usual places, and he’d heard no more than he already knew—she was in port. Other than that, she could be anywhere.

He stopped his pacing by the bed. She’d have found the Ghost’s real name by now, perhaps. Every rack ship had more than one name, like every rack. An outward name, and an inward one. For racks, only the most trusted ever got to know the inward name. For a ship, only the captain. Outwardly his old ship had been called Gast’s Ghost. Inwardly, it was something quite different, a name in this case etched behind the bed head.

Van Gast hadn’t quite got used to a different ship, not yet. The way the Glass Dagger moved to the swell, how far or fast he could push it, all its little quirks that made it seem as alive as any woman, and as unpredictable. But he’d made a start on its secret name, on turning this from a Remorian trader to a rack ship, through and through. He pulled away the bed head and got out his knife, thinking as he carved.

A little light robbery, and revenge. The excuse he’d given Holden for coming here—unbelieved—was that in the chaos they could earn good, hard cash. True enough, in and of itself. Racks could smell an opportunity from leagues away, and now they were swarming round Estovan.

But Josie wasn’t after just the small scams, he was pretty sure of that. Her twisty mind wouldn’t bother with them. Neither would he, usually. Something big, that was what she was after. Mind on a big twist, Skrymir had said, and she’d said much the same herself. The man who’d died at Bilsen was Yelen, and now Josie was going to twist his brother.

Which was madness. The Yelen ruled this city with a rod of iron and a bloody blade, at least within the city walls. Things were a bit more freeform in the delta, true, but because they allowed it, because they knew it was good for trade and the money dealt out here would, as often as not, end up in the coffers of the licensed traders, one way or another.

The Yelen were the law here, and they kept that law with teeth and guards and guile. Even Van Gast didn’t pickpocket inside the city walls. He liked his hands where they were. The guards were implacable, keen-eyed and—acolytes of the god Oku to a man—utterly unbribable. The gods themselves couldn’t steal so much as a copper fish-head from the Yelen and live to tell about it. Even thinking about it was stupid.

Van Gast found he was grinning. Stupid, but thrilling. To be the rack who stole from the Yelen and lived. Or rather, one of the pair. Him and Josie—together no one could beat them, never had been able to, and that was what he had to show her, that apart they were nothing, together they were unstoppable.

He started on the next letter of the name, his hands moving on their own as he thought. How to get in? You had to get into the city, into the palace, and not be suspicious, not look like a rack. Josie had always had trouble with that, with her fair hair and those braids. Unmistakable. The city was hard enough for her to get into without being noticed, and getting into the palace would be a thousand times harder.

Van Gast though, Van Gast could blend in smooth as silk, something they’d used time and again in their scams. Shame all his gear was on the Ghost. He’d have to improvise. He leaped to his feet, almost laughing with the thrill of it. All of a sudden this was no longer about getting Josie back, getting his ship back, his life back. This was about him doing what he did best, and laughing while he did it. The stupid-but-exciting thing, always. He didn’t know quite how yet, but he was going to scam the Yelen until their teeth bled.

First he had to find where Josie was berthed. He wrenched open the door to his quarters, strode across the deck—quiet now during the hottest part of the day, when most everyone slept—to the stairwell, dove down into the cramped darkness below and opened a door without knocking. It was his ship, after all.

Guld fell off his chair, the silver ball of magic balanced on his palm disappearing with a faint popping sound. He landed in a heap of tatty robes, stammering, “Van, I—um—”

Van Gast took pity on him, helped him up and tried not to be too impatient while Guld dusted himself down and arranged his robes so the burn marks didn’t show too much.

Finally, Van Gast couldn’t wait any more. “Well? Have you found where she’s berthed?”

Guld blushed and stared down at his stained fingers, the mark of his magic. Kyr’s mercy, he was such a mouse, but very good with his magic, which was why Van Gast kept him on. Well, possibly a bit of pity crept in there—Van Gast was determined to find Guld a lady for himself at some point. If Guld could ever get a sentence out in the presence of any woman over sixteen and under sixty without twice as many “ums” as words.

“Not yet, Van. There’s, um, hundreds of places she could be and—”

“And what? What do I pay you for?”

Guld ticked off on his fingers. “Weather control, scrying, contact with other racketeers and their mages, occasional explosions.”

“And finding people I ask you to find, add that to your list. Comes under scrying, I expect. You’ve asked the other ship’s mages? Someone must have seen her, the ship, something.”

“I’m sorry, she’s running without a mage at the moment, so no one’s been in contact with her. If she’s in port—”

Van Gast recalled the taste of her lips on his, all sea salt and wind and wide skies. The hint of her wink, the hint that he had a chance still, of glorious, scamming, thieving possibilities. A chance of her. He wasn’t sure which made his heart beat faster. “She’s here, for sure. And planning something. Something big.”

“Well then, she’s keeping quiet about it. I dare say she’s altered the ship enough it won’t be mistaken for yours. It could take me days, maybe a week, Van. Sorry.”

Van Gast sagged into the chair, all the wind out of his sails. If he could find the ship, he could sneak in, no problem. Sneaking was second nature, and once in, he could be alone with her, and that was always his best bet. In public she was all sharp sword and sharper words, brittle and dangerous. Alone…alone she was something else, the other side of her, the soft part. Alone he could make her see, he was sure of it, and then they could plot and plan and come out rich as kings. After he’d spent a good long time making up for lost time in bed. The thought of that part brought him out in a sweat.

“All right, you haven’t found her. Yet. Keep looking. In the meantime, anything else for me? What are all the other racks up to? Where’s the gap, the opportunity? Where’s the money?”

Guld’s hesitant grin crept across his face, shy and quiet like the mouse he was. He became all business. “As you’d expect, with all this going on, there’s plenty of thievery. Small stuff mostly—the Yelen guards are clamping down on everything, hard. Concentrating on inside the city walls, to be sure, but they’ve come out into the delta a couple of times the last week, so I hear. A lot of racks are taking what they can and leaving. Too dangerous, for now. Waiting for it all to cool down. Don’t you think you should—”

“No, I do not. What else?”

Guld twisted his fingers, his stammer coming back at Van Gast’s insistence. “The Y-y-yelen, they, well I think they’re planning something too. Merchantmen inside the palace, maybe just for safety but that’s never happened before—they usually stay in their houses on the avenue by the licensed docks. Maybe one or two inside the palace at a time, negotiating and whatnot. Now there’s all those who keep a house in port, and a dozen or more of the bigger traders from as far as Tanara. Rumors of some sort of trade reception, renegotiations of contracts, that the Yelen are wanting to expand now the Remorians are no longer a power.”

“Are they now? Interesting.”

“And the Yelen have Remorian mages to help them. Weak, as yet, but it won’t take long to grow those crystals back, at least enough that they could blow me to bits without thinking about it. And the bonding—the rumors are right about that. All ex-slaves they find, they’re rebonding them, or executing them if they’re too far gone.”

Van Gast rubbed at the fading scar on his wrist. A mage-bond, a magical shackle to your body, heart and mind. He’d only borne it for a few minutes at most, and that had been enough. Josie had suffered one for weeks, for him, to try to save him but he’d—he’d not think about that. Holden and Ilsa and his new crew had borne them all their lives, and now were finally free. It had taken a lot of sacrifice, betrayal and blood to get them that freedom, and he’d be damned by Kyr if he’d let them go back.

Yet the Yelen welcoming the merchanters into the palace—that was interesting. Very interesting. Josie couldn’t sneak in and pretend to be one, and nor could her first mate Skrymir—both Gan, both too fair of skin and blond of hair. Too obviously not mainlanders. No matter Josie had got rid of her braids, one look at the pair of them and you knew them for racks—they had to be, they weren’t Estovanians or merchanters or even Remorians. Skrymir could pass for a bodyguard, but Josie? Besides, racking was all in the attitude, and Josie couldn’t shrug that off. She always ended up threatening someone with a bullet in the face before long—diplomacy wasn’t a strong point. But Van Gast could take up the façade, could pretend and charm and flatter-slick his way through any crowd. He’d done so many times before, in cons and twists and scams. Maybe that’s what she wanted him for. To get in, among the Yelen.

“Guld, I need you to do something for me. If the Yelen are rounding up Remorians, then I can’t send any of the crew. But you’ll be all right. I need a merchanter outfit, like the one I had aboard the Ghost.”

Guld nodded earnestly. “Even the corset?”

Van Gast sighed. “Sadly, even the corset. And don’t forget the pig fat for my hair.” Although he rather would—it stunk like off bacon and always took forever to get out. “Needs must when a woman has your heart and is ready to twist it out. Also, when there’s money to be made, young Guld.”

Van Gast made his thoughtful way back to his quarters. A snifter of brandy would be just the thing while he sat and thought about what all this meant, planned how to get into the palace. His head bubbled with the possibilities, and he had no doubt, no doubt at all, that if this was what Josie was after. She’d have a plan twistier than a ball of string. This was going to be glorious. He threw himself into the captain’s chair, put his feet on the desk and reached for the brandy.

When he lifted it to pour, a piece of paper came with it, stuck to the sticky drips on the bottom. That hadn’t been there earlier, he was sure of it. He sloshed a good measure of brandy into the glass and sipped at it while he studied the slip of paper.

His name was written in a bold, sure hand on the front. That narrowed the sender down. Most racks could read and write—except Josie and Skrymir, because most Gan considered learning their letters to be outlandish and never bothered. But again, while most racks could read all right, writing was a stick-your-tongue-out-in-concentration affair, and they kept to writing their names and maybe the odd rude word or two to scrawl on outhouse doors. Van Gast managed a bit better, because as a captain he had to, but this writing was the hand of someone who wrote well and often. A hired scribe? Best open it and find out.

He scanned it quickly, saw the name at the bottom, and read it again.

Van,

I need you to meet me at the Godsquare, by Herjan’s temple. Sunset.

Josie.

Van Gast rubbed at his breastbone, at the itch that had started there. His little-magics, his trouble bone. And just what sort of trouble? Josie couldn’t write, though he supposed she could have got someone to do it for her. Only why would she give the game away by hiring a scribe? Pretending to hate each other, that was half the fun for her. Well, and for him. Besides, it had always helped them scam the living daylights out of all and sundry. If she was giving that up, it had to be something big, something important. Maybe something dangerous and stupid for him to thrill over, like scamming the Yelen.

Only…only this wasn’t like Josie, not at all. Or not like the Josie she had been. Van Gast hiccupped against the burn in his chest. Only one way to find out. Either way, he’d see Josie. He cast a look out the window. Not long till sunset—already the sun was lowering toward the sea, lighting up all the little shanties of the delta in red and orange, making them seem almost attractive. He sipped his brandy and considered. Best not go too obviously as Van Gast. Not at the moment, no matter how much he enjoyed giving the guards the slip. He needn’t go overboard with it, because the guards wouldn’t know what he looked like.

He transferred his few bits and pieces to the less gaudy shirt he’d bought for spare, a deep green that was also handy for slipping into the shadows. Same with the breeches—a plain and dull brown—before he buckled on his pistol and sword, hid a few knives. It only took a few moments to scrape his hair back into a pigtail, and there, he looked just like a merchantman’s crewhand. Except for the bright red boots, but there wasn’t much he could do about them, not having any others, and he’d die and go to the Deeps before he braved Estovan barefoot.

He considered going out via the deck, but Holden would be bound to ask questions, raise objections about him going inside the city walls, off to where the danger—and thrill—was tenfold. Best not to worry him. Instead, Van Gast slipped out the window, down a rope and onto the jetty before, with a jaunty whistle, he strode off along the wharf as though he owned it.

* * *

As the sun approached the horizon, Holden left the crews to their meal below. Gilda was holding court among a drove of new admirers and Tallia slid in among them as though she belonged, laughing at the more risqué talk and fielding the over-friendly hands of the newly hired racks. She made Holden ill at ease somehow, with her effortless smile and her sunny enthusiasm. He wondered if he had little-magics like Van Gast whether they’d be itching right now, and why.

He made his thoughtful way along the deck, thinking to talk to Van Gast. He wanted to be talking to Ilsa, but he still couldn’t quite grasp the words he needed that would make everything all right between them, that would broach the ice that had grown around them. At times he wished he still had the bond on, because then he’d have no need to think on it.

The first mate told him Van Gast was in his quarters and he went there first, hoping to settle his mind about Tallia. He knocked on the door and, when there was no answer, peered in. Peculiar. Van Gast’s new clothes were strewn carelessly across the bed in a riot of clashing colors. A glass of brandy on the desk, half drunk—most unusual. In Holden’s experience, Van Gast didn’t believe in half-drunk anything.

Van Gast had been behaving oddly, to say the least. Or maybe this was how he usually was, a thought that made Holden’s stomach churn. He didn’t really know that much about the man, when it came down to it. He didn’t mean to pry, but the open slip of paper was there on the desk for all to see. A message from Josie.

The door opened again behind him and Holden turned, feeling guilty for intruding. Ilsa stood there, looking beguiling in her new dress. The pale green brought out the chestnut in her hair and she glowed. The bodice was low cut and it looked as if she’d made it even lower. The silk clung to every curve. Holden could barely tear his eyes away, until a tiny little worm of a thought popped into his head. Why was she coming to Van Gast’s quarters dressed like that? He struggled to find words, any words that would bring her back to him.

“You look very beautiful” was all that came to mind.

Ilsa smiled, a pale wan thing full of the ice between them, and came in. Her perfume wafted round Holden, of jasmine and spice. He couldn’t recall her ever wearing perfume before. “Where’s Van?”

Holden dropped the note back onto the desk. “Gone to the Godsquare.”

Ilsa came to the desk and glanced at the note. Holden burned with the nearness of her—and the distance. She picked up the note and then dropped it as though it was of little consequence, but her lips pinched.

Holden wanted to take her hand, wanted to kiss her as he had done once, kiss her to make it all better, to soothe her, comfort her. But her hunched shoulder was cold, her eyes colder.

“Ilsa—”

She cut him off with a turn of her shoulder, her hands rattling among the things on Van’s desk. “What do I have to do?” she asked, her face turned away, her voice small and afraid. “What do I have to do to make you come back to me?”

He wished she’d look at him. Any way, even the cold way. “I never left you. Please, Ilsa, I just want to make it right between us, but I don’t know how. I don’t know what you want, how to make you happy.”

He took her hands in his one but she pulled them away, her face scrunched in a frown. Her mouth worked as though she too struggled for words, and then she ran for the door, slamming it behind her. Holden hesitated, just a fraction, but enough that by the time he followed her, determined to do anything, say anything to make it up to her, make it right whatever it was, she was gone. Down the gangplank and disappearing into the crowded wharf under a sunset sky.

Tallia was right behind her.

It didn’t take Van Gast’s little-magics to know something odd was going on. Holden tried to calm his mind, tried to remember how patterns and order had once soothed him. But there was no pattern to this, no comfort in the straight lines of the planks along the deck, in the complicated tangles of rigging or in the equally tangled streets and shanties he could see. All was chaos and swirling shapes, like his mind.

He took a firm grip on himself, a deep breath that did nothing to calm him. Van Gast—something was going on, and Van Gast was in the middle of it, he was sure. Up to his neck in ten thousand gold sharks’ worth of trouble, and Holden knew just where Van Gast was going to be. Waiting for Josie by Herjan’s temple, waiting for a woman he’d betrayed and hoping she’d forgive him.

He could help Van, warn him perhaps, or he could follow Ilsa. It was time to make a choice, and he strode down the gangplank and out into the teeming, swirling chaos.