Jeryon lets her swoop, which spooks the whales. Gray falls behind, but with a few beats of her wings she catches up. She isn’t straining. She’s waiting for the order. He gives it, and she fires past the whales like a harpoon from a cannon. As she slows, Jeryon sees another pod ahead and beyond it a galley heading east.
He circles far to larboard. Gray is so close to the water, small and dark, they might not have been seen. Should he just continue past them? He doesn’t want to risk getting shot at. He’s tempted to show off, confident that when they get to the Dawn Lands no one will believe they saw a man riding a dragon. He decides to fly just close enough to read the galley’s flags. Maybe he can persuade the captain to make a detour to the island. He could pay him off with a few dragon bones, more than recompense for the ruin of his schedule.
The galley is Hanoshi. He doesn’t recognize the company insignia, a gold circle in a blue field. It must be a new outfit, which is unusual, but not unprecedented. Perhaps a company split or two combined. He does recognize the captain’s flag. It bears the insignia of his former third mate, Tuse.
So his mates did fool the Trust. Why isn’t this a Trust ship, though? Like all officers, Tuse wouldn’t be able to work for another company in the League for five years after leaving the Trust. Who would have made him a captain anyway? No one is that good a mate. Tuse wasn’t. Tuse’s share might have filled his pockets to bursting, but you can’t buy a command, even in Hanosh. So how could he have moved up the ranks so quickly?
A terrible thought strikes him: What if the Trust doesn’t exist anymore? Where would that leave him? Who else could he trust? Blue Island, the Trust’s main rival? Hanosh Consolidated, the city’s most powerful company? The former licks the latter’s boots, and the latter would kick him to the curb to confiscate Gray and the island while the other companies fought to wrench them away. Jeryon bends over the saddle. His throat wants to retch, but his stomach feels empty.
Jeryon is directly astern now, and the galley hasn’t made any motion that would indicate he’s been spotted. They’re probably looking at the whales, wondering if they could take a few without falling behind schedule. Jeryon realizes he has to give up his own schedule. He had planned to be over land by star-rise, to hide overnight in the coastal hills north of Yness, and to be in Hanosh a day or two later. He has to be opportunistic, though. What would Solet say? He has to grasp?
How fortunate he is to have found someone he wants to reach out and take hold of. After all, Tuse was the final vote. Tuse put the poth in the boat. She wouldn’t care for what he wishes he could do, so he’ll just question him. What he’ll do with him afterward will depend on his answers.
Jeryon has Gray glide in a slow circle to keep them in place while he surveys the ship. How can he get the yolk without breaking the egg? The stink of sulfur wafts over him downwind from the ship. And it’s a rotten egg at that, Jeryon thinks. He laughs. He knows what Tuse would do if a dragon attacked. He doesn’t have the imagination to do anything except what he saw Jeryon do. His old oarmaster is in for a few surprises.
PART TWO
* * *
The Mates
CHAPTER SIX
The Oarmaster
1
* * *
Tuse puts his massive foot on the foredeck of the penteconter Hopper and flicks some grime off his dragonskin boots. The stitching’s worn, the heel should be replaced, and the piping at the tip is coming loose, but the red-tinged black skin looks as fresh and tough as it did the day it was flensed beside the Comber. Officers and sailors of Hanoshi companies must all wear sandals of Hanoshi make, but Tuse received these boots from the Shield and the City Council approved their use, which is tantamount to law. They remind his crew of what he had to do to get this ship, which is one reason he doesn’t like to wear them.
That they remind him too is the other.
He also doesn’t like the blue embroidered pants recently foisted on officers. They pull. They’re hot. The cloth won’t last. They’re only meant to make him look fancier than the Blue Island captains. At least his blouse is light and loose, if more gold than a captain’s used to be. He won’t wear the blue felt hat, however. Let them dock his monthly. They’re already taking out the rent for his uniform. Nothing with a feather will go on his head.
Standing watch between the harpoon cannons, the ship’s boy, Rowan, says in a hush, “Whales. Off the starboard bow.”
The kid’s as hard and skinny as an iron, and as sharp too, the son of a sergeant, but this is only his third voyage and he’s still soft with awe for the sea. Tuse envies him that.
“Do you think you’ll scare them?” Tuse says. “Tell the ship, son.”
“Whales!” Rowan hollers. “Off the starboard bow!”
Tuse flinches. The boy smiles. Tuse says, “Actually, maybe you will scare them.”
Tuse considers the patch of rough water and, beyond it, another. Two pods are coming together. “Tell Press to pipe me some cannons, then bring us close for a calf or two.”
“You’ll take a cannon?”