Canticle

the butter.

Rafe shrugged. “Not long. But given the circumstances, we must be cautious.” He slid the note across the table.

Petronus took a bite of the bread, set it down, wiped his hands on a cloth napkin and picked up the paper. He read it quickly, his stomach lurching as he did.

My master sent a squad for the others.

He read the note again slowly now, the dread in his belly growing colder as he did. Erlund was in hiding after a double had been killed on the same night Petronus was attacked. The Marsh King and the Crown Prince of Turam were killed at Rudolfo’s Firstborn Feast. Queen Meirov’s heir-a ten-year-old son-had been butchered in his bed. There were others, too. The male heirs and in some instances, the minor lords themselves, throughout the Named Lands, had all been struck, including the loose affiliation of city-states along the Emerald Coasts and even a few of the stronger houses on the Divided Isle. He passed the note to Grymlis and watched the old guard pale when he read it. When he finished, he passed it back to Rafe.

Petronus looked to the bread but knew now he wouldn’t be eating it. “These are the most powerful families in the Named Lands.”

“Aye,” Rafe Merrique said. “Excluding two.”

Petronus thought about this. “The Forest Houses and House Li Tam.”

Rafe nodded. “Indeed. And the finger points to your friend Rudolfo again.”

Yes, Petronus thought, just on the heels of the Named Lands going to war against the Gypsy Scouts in the mistaken belief that he’d brought down Windwir. In that instance, Rudolfo had been framed by Sethbert in a strategy to shore up the loss of Windwir’s impact on the Entrolusian economy by seizing Rudolfo’s resource-rich lands. Petronus’s mind reeled as it worked the cipher. If Marsher Scouts, under blood magicks, had killed their own king and these others, it meant a brewing storm as surely as a red sky at morning. But he could not believe Rudolfo would be behind it. He knew the man, and it was not in his nature. But there was another-an older friend-more likely.

“It smells of Vlad Li Tam’s handiwork,” he said, and it broke his heart to say it. Vlad Li Tam and his children had sailed out from the Named Lands. The last visit of his iron armada, seven months past, was still the tavern talk of Caldus Bay.

Rafe filled a plate with roasted ham and spiced potatoes. “Our friends concur. They believe there’s a Li Tam network of some kind still in place.”

Petronus’s eyes narrowed. “You seem to be quite privy to your friends’ knowledge.”

Rafe smiled. “Knowing my employer’s motivations and suspicions is often good business. And I have an interest in the success of their experiment in democracy.”

Petronus nodded. It wouldn’t be the first time the notion of representative government had raised its head in the New World. But he doubted it would come to much. Even the Order, as enlightened as it had been in many ways, had recognized the unlikelihood of that approach to government working, though the earliest days of Settlement had operated in a similar fashion. Still, he’d followed the Delta’s civil war with interest, picking up what news he could by the bird, though political machinations weren’t his primary focus. And he could see why the notion of free, democratic city-states at the delta of the Three Rivers could benefit someone in Rafe’s line of work. A thought struck him. “You keep a thumb on the pulse of your employer?”

Rafe chewed his food and swallowed, chasing it with a mug of lemon beer. “Certainly. As much as I can.”

Petronus leaned forward. “Then perhaps you’d have some idea as to why they’d want to fund my escape and harbor me?”

Rafe smiled. “I have theories. Nothing solid to stand on, of course.”

Petronus sat back. “Indulge me.”

The pirate chuckled. “Isn’t it obvious? You killed Sethbert. He wasn’t terribly popular at home or abroad. Especially among this particular crowd. That makes you a kind of hero, I suspect. You are also the last Pope of the Androfrancine Order.” Rafe must have seen the dark cloud pass over Petronus’s face. “Regardless of your feelings on that matter, it makes you a powerful political figure with threads of kin-clave woven into a fairly vast tapestry of connections.” He paused to sip more beer. “They face a nearly impossible task and need all of the friends they can make. And judging by the corpse in the hold, you need all of the friends you can make, as well.”

The day Petronus had dropped the knife and ring beside Sethbert’s body, he’d also dropped all notions of involvement in affairs of state. And the day he’d first seen Vlad’s satchel of papers, he’d given himself to a new work that required all of his attention. He had no time for violent idealists and their own backward-looking dreams. He turned to Grymlis. “Do you concur with our host?”

“I do, Father,” the old soldier said. He didn’t smile as he said it. “And I believe I can keep you safe there. Safer than in Caldus Bay.”

He nodded slowly. “And do you think they could be the ones who warned you of the attack?”

Grymlis shook his head. “I doubt it. Why would they remain anonymous in that case? If they truly wish your influence on their cause-at any level, quiet or public-they would be better served to build your trust quickly with forthrightness.”

Petronus sighed, pushing the food on his plate around with his fork. He had no appetite left. “We’ll know soon enough, I imagine.” He pushed his chair back from the table and stood. “If you gentlemen will excuse me?”

At their nods, he left the galley and returned to his room. Over the course of his three days aboard the Kinshark, Petronus had availed himself of his room’s small shelf of books. He’d picked his way through Gervais’s Four Plays of the Early Settlements; read smatterings of verse by the Poet-Pope Windwir, namesake of the fallen city; and had perused Enoch’s largely apocryphal History of the Wizard Kings, starting with the Year of the Falling Moon and the last of the Weeping Czars, Frederico, who fell in love with a wizard’s daughter and brought down the wrath of Raj Y’Zir. These books lay open on the small table, waiting for him, but the conversation over breakfast had stripped him of his hunger for them.

Instead, he went to the packet of papers and started winding through that Whymer Maze once again, jotting notes as he went.

Vlad Li Tam

He awoke to water and darkness, opening his mouth to drink hot air. It was like breathing through a sock that had been boiled in urine, and he retched. Nothing came up.

Vlad Li Tam rolled from his side to his back, gradually becoming aware of himself again.

After how long asleep? No, not asleep, he remembered. Drugged. The bittersweet taste of the kallaberries felt dry in his mouth, and invisible hammers pounded at his skull. He groaned and stretched.

His hands and feet were tied now, and a makeshift blindfold pulled at his ears. Tepid water-about two inches of it-sloshed across his naked skin as the ship rocked back and forth. He could not feel the vibration of the steam engines through the hull, nor could he hear them.

He swallowed and licked his dry, cracked lips. His tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth.

I must speak. The effort drew bright flashes of light behind his eyes. “I am Vlad Li Tam,” he croaked. “First Father of House Li Tam.” He coughed. “Release me.”

He heard a high giggle and a girl’s voice, soft and soothing to his ears. A hatch opened, and light footfalls splashed in the water. “Already you understand,” she said, “and yet you don’t.” The voice lowered. “In time, you will indeed be released. And I will help you find your way.”

Vlad shivered despite the heat. “Who are you? Where is my First Grandson?”

“I am your Bloodletter, Vlad Li Tam, and your Kin-healer, too. And your First Grandson finishes the work given to him.” She giggled again. “Soon enough he will return bearing gifts for you.”

He heard her move closer, and now he could smell her. It was a jungle smell, a floral smell, sweet and thick. He heard the rustle of cloth and felt the rim of a cup pressed to his dry mouth. “Drink this.”

At first, he resisted. But the coolness of the liquid seduced his lips, and he took in the water she offered. He swallowed it. “Where are you taking me?”

She laughed again. “It is not your place to know it,” she said. “Not yet. But when we arrive, our work