Hercol start whacking us, it’s got to be now.”
The scare tactic worked. In short order Neeps too was dressed, after a fashion, and the boys stumbled into the corridor.
“I dreamed of my mother,” said Pazel.
Neeps responded with a yawn.
“She was free. Not a slave or a Mzithrini wife, like Chadfallow’s afraid she’s become. She was doing something on a table-top with jars of colored sand, or smoke maybe, in a little house in a poor quarter of some city-I thought I knew which city, when I dreamed it, but I don’t remember now. And there was a dog looking in at the window. That’s curious, isn’t it?”
Neeps might well have been sleepwalking. “I dreamed you were a sow,” he said.
In the stateroom, Thasha and Marila were finishing a breakfast of Masalym oats, boiled with molasses. Felthrup crouched on the table eating bread and butter, a cloth napkin tied at his neck. The boys looked around carefully for Hercol. The Tholjassan often began their fighting-classes by appearing out of nowhere and swinging hard at them with a practice sword.
“Don’t worry,” said Thasha, “he’s not hiding anywhere.”
“We’re alone, are we?” said Pazel, surly already.
Thasha stared at him. “Isn’t that what I just said? Nobody’s lurking in one of the cabins, if that’s what you mean.”
“Well that’s blary good,” said Neeps, yawning again. “Because you just never know.”
“Come here, you two,” said Marila quickly. “Be quiet. Eat oats.”
At least Fulbreech hasn’t moved in, thought Pazel acidly. Yet.
Then, waking farther, he shook his head. “Hold on. The ixchel. Where are the ixchel?”
“One is behind you,” said Ensyl, leaping onto the back of an armchair, startling both boys. But to Pazel’s shock, the young ixchel woman proceeded to explain that she was the last. The other ten who had sought refuge in the stateroom had departed at sunrise, not planning to return.
“They asked me to thank you,” she said, “and to say that you may always count on their help, should your paths cross again. Those are not idle words, either: ixchel do not make promises of aid unless they mean to keep them.”
“But where in blazes did they go?” Neeps demanded. “The same place as all the others?”
“So I imagine,” said Ensyl. “They asked if I would hinder their departure, and I said they were guests, not prisoners. Then they offered to take me with them. ‘Your final chance to stand with your people,’ they grandly declared. ‘I might do that, if my people stood for anything,’ I replied. Then they spat on the backs of their hands and called me a traitor, and left.”
“But everyone knew where to run, that first day,” said Pazel, dropping into an armchair.
Ensyl nodded. “Every clan has its disaster protocol. They change often, but they are always remembered. If the signal came we were all to fly to different rendezvous points deep in the ship. Elders were to meet us there, and take us to a place of safety.”
“Safe from Rose?” said Thasha, incredulous.
“We doubted that ourselves,” said Ensyl. “But this plan came from Lord Talag, and it was followed without question. I heard the ten who took shelter here discussing it-though they fell silent at my approach. All the rendezvous points were on the orlop deck, between the steerage compartment and the augrongs’ den. If they had not been trapped on the upper decks, that is where they would have gone.”
“Orlop, portside, amidships,” said Neeps. “That’s a lonely spot, all right. Especially now that the animals are-” He stopped, looking from one face to another. “The animals. The live animal compartment. It’s right smack there, isn’t it, forward of the augrongs?”
“Yes,” said Thasha, with a glance at Marila. “And that’s where the… strangest things have happened, to some of us.”
Marila’s round face looked troubled, and Pazel knew why: several months ago, Thasha and Marila had one day found themselves on a very different Chathrand. A Chathrand sailing a frigid winter sea, a Chathrand crewed by pirates. They had barely escaped with their lives.
Of course men passed through those chambers every day, and met with nothing strange. Pazel himself had spent more hours than he cared to recall filling buckets with manure and spoiled hay. Still, it was an odd coincidence. If the ixchel had gone where Thasha and Marila went, they couldn’t be much better off. But perhaps the magic didn’t work that way. Perhaps one never went to the same place twice.
Suddenly Thasha gasped. She placed a hand on her chest, then started to her feet.
“Someone’s just stepped through the wall! It’s not Hercol, nor Fiffengurt or Bolutu or Greysan. I didn’t let them pass through; they just came. Get your weapons! Quick!”
She and the two boys raced for their swords. Marila grabbed Felthrup and backed away. Jorl and Suzyt crouched low, silenced by a warning finger from their mistress, every muscle tensed to spring. Pazel gripped the sword that had been Eberzam Isiq’s, wishing he could use it half as well as Thasha used her own. Hercol was right. He always said the worst thing we could do was to depend on the magic wall.
Thasha flattened herself against the wall near the door, sword raised to strike whoever entered. Then they heard the footsteps: a single, heavy figure, walking with long strides to the door. When they reached the threshold, someone knocked.
Thasha looked at Pazel: a tender look, gone in half a heartbeat. Then she set her teeth and snarled: “If that’s you, Arunis, come. Ildraquin is waiting for you. It’s here in my hand.”
She was lying; she had only her own fine sword, not Hercol’s Curse-Cleaver. Then a voice spoke from beyond the passageway: “Your pardon, Lady Thasha. It is only me.”
They stared at one another. The voice belonged to Prince Olik. The door opened a few inches, and the man’s bright silver eyes and beak-like nose appeared in the gap.
“A splendid morning to you all,” he said.
Thasha opened the door wide. She lowered the sword but did not sheathe it. “Your Highness,” she said. “How did you get in here? No one has ever been able to pass through the wall without my permission.”
“Then you must have given it, my lady,” said Olik.
“I did no such thing,” said Thasha.
All at once she leaped back into fighting stance and pointed her sword at Olik’s breast. “Stay where you are!” she shouted. “We haven’t seen Prince Olik in four days-and suddenly here you appear out of nowhere, alone? How do I know you’re not Arunis in disguise? Prove that you’re you!”
Olik smiled. “That is just what the Karyskans said. Mistaken identity appears to be my fate. Alas, I’m not sure how to prove myself-but as it happens, I’ve not come alone.”
“Thasha Isiq!”
Captain Rose’s bellow carried down the passage. Olik stepped aside, and they could all see him, toes to the painted line, fists pounding empty air. Behind him, pressing as close as they dared, were four well-armed dlomic warriors.
“Let me pass!” bellowed Rose. “This is a royal visit, I’m escorting His Majesty on a tour of my ship!”
“Your guards I won’t allow,” said Thasha to the prince.
“I am delighted to hear it,” said Olik. “They were inflicted on me by Counselor Vadu.”
“And you yourself, Sire? Not armed?” she asked.
“Certainly I am,” he said. “Knife in my boot. I’ve carried one that way since I was a boy. Would you feel better if I surrendered it?”
“Yes,” said Thasha, “and I’m glad you told me the truth. I spotted that knife straightaway.”
Olik passed her the knife. It was broad and well used, the leopard-and-sun design on the sheath nearly worn away. Without turning to the hallway again, Thasha said, “Come in, Captain Rose.”
Rose’s fast, limping gait echoed down the passage, and then he barreled into the chamber and spread his hands. “The master stateroom,” he said, rather more loudly than necessary. “Fifty-four heads of state have traveled in these chambers during the ship’s public history alone-her early years being classified, you understand. Note the aromatic woods, the Virabalm crystal in the chandelier. To your left there’s a panel that once disguised a dumbwaiter. And the walls are triply insulated, for the warmth and privacy of our guests.”
He slammed the door and fell silent, leaning on the frame, breathing like some winded animal. Then, slowly,
