Canticle

Now, the soul-shattered father and grandfather lay cast aside like ill-fitting clothing. In its place was a cold river of a man flowing toward one purpose-to avenge himself upon his tormentors, upon the murderers of his family.

To do that, he had to escape. He was in no condition now to mount any kind of vengeance. He could barely walk. He’d given up hope some time ago of being able to rescue his family from the clutches of this Y’Zirite madness. At the pace they moved at, they would all be dead, or in the case of the younger children, marked and shipped away, before he could ever find the strength to do anything about it.

And he also knew that no one would come looking for him. Whatever remained of his family and iron armada would certainly have implemented emergency protocols and fled for a safe place to reassess the situation. Unless Ria spoke true; unless his first grandson even now prepared to capture the others as well.

It left Vlad Li Tam with nothing to do but hold on and bide his time. He would have vengeance for this. He would have it one hundredfold.

“Everyone has a weakness, Vlad,” his father had told him. “If they don’t,” he added, “you can create one within them if you are patient and crafty.”

He thought about his father a lot these days. It was a source of his hatred and fury. He found now, in these few moments of clarity he allowed himself, that many of his father’s words had been clues in this Whymer Maze.

My family is my weakness, Vlad Li Tam understood now. But more than that, he understood that it was a weakness his father had built within him, intending Vlad for this very day.

The depth of that betrayal, at first, had made him despondent. But now, it enraged him, and he exhilarated in the strength of that rage as it flooded him, driving out the fog and grief.

He thought again about the slender volume his First Grandson, Mal Li Tam, had shown him. Your own father betrays you.

But not just me, Vlad Li Tam realized. Behind his closed eyes, as the hot tears of anger coursed down over his cheeks, he saw the Desolation of Windwir and knew it for his father’s work.

He has betrayed us all.

Vlad Li Tam banked his anger and took another sip of the water.

Tomorrow, when those firm hands reached for him, Vlad Li Tam would be gone again. The broken, anguished animal would be there in his place. For now, he needed rest.

When he finally fell into fitful sleep, his dead children surrounded him, their mouths moving as they formed their last words beneath his watching eye and beneath the cutter’s knife.

Even in his dreams, their poetry made him weep.

Rudolfo

Rudolfo laid down the last page in Petronus’s packet and rubbed his eyes. He’d read what he could-certainly none of the notes from the former Pope had been intelligible, but the other papers had made perfect sense.

Gods, what have they done? As a general with firsthand knowledge of what Xhum Y’Zir’s spell was capable of, Rudolfo saw clearly that the Androfrancine maps and notations were the work of frightened strategists frantically reaching for some way to protect the New World.

Sethbert had taken but one mechoservitor and infused him with the power of that devastating spell. But the Androfrancines had intended to make a dozen such weapons and deploy them to key strategic points along the coastlines of the Named Lands.

There was only one sound reason to do such a thing: the fear of an invasion.

Still, it wasn’t much of a leap in logic for the mad Entrolusian Overseer to see a threat in this-these maps showed three of the metal spell-casters on his Delta.

Because the Delta was the path to Windwir.

Rudolfo shook his head and shuffled through the papers again. He stopped again at the authorization letter, saw Petronus’s signature and stamp there upon that dread parchment and sighed. Certainly, the old man could not have been the one to bring back the spell. Rudolfo found that impossible to believe.

And yet Vlad Li Tam’s life’s work had been making Rudolfo into a shepherd of the light-moving the library to the Ninefold Forest, set deeper north in a more secluded and strategic place. Another defensive move.

They meant to protect us. It was the only note he could read on any of the documents, and it was in a small, pinched script that he recognized instantly.

He’d known that Vlad Li Tam had visited the Ninefold Forest for the trial just before leaving the Named Lands; he’d learned it later from Jin Li Tam when the time for honesty was finally upon them a month later. And after the trial, Petronus had fled for Caldus Bay, weeping at what he’d done.

Perhaps the two of them worked together, now, with Petronus gathering what he could through his bird lines and Vlad Li Tam scouring the seas for evidence of some external threat.

With recent developments being what they were, it was strategic and reasonable for them to act upon their assumptions.

Windwir, he realized, was just the beginning. Everything about the Named Lands depended upon the Order. Their magicks and mechanicals, their knowledge and access to the glories of the former age made them a critical prop to the economic and social fabric of the New World. With Windwir out of the way and the Androfrancines broken, the gate was open and the sheep were nervous.

And now, more chaos. The Delta was ineffectual, just now entering into a tenuous peace brokered with the potential cost of Petronus’s life if Esarov was wrong and the trial went badly. Once the strongest nation of the Named Lands, it was now crippled. And the problems in the Marshlands-the assassinations carried out by rogue scouts among Winters’s people-these pointed to further unrest brewing violently ahead of them. Already, he’d sent birds to dispatch his own Wandering Army to meet Pylos and Turam and try to avert another war.

A war that would keep the eyes of the Named Lands focused upon its own internal strife.

Somewhere out there, a master of Queen’s War moved nations like game pieces and drove them into a corner they could not come back from.

And even I am distracted. Jakob’s illness had trumped even this imminent threat. Yet it had been the simplest decision he had ever made, if he were truly honest. Perhaps because he knew he could trust the woman he had married despite her origins. He would truly have to work hard not to honor his vow and kill Vlad Li Tam when he found him. Her father’s role in the death of his brother, parents and closest friend was a constant and gnawing thing-something that kept his heart lost in a Whymer Maze when it came to loving her, though he could trust her with his Ninefold Forest.

But there was no Whymer Maze when it came to Jakob, the off-spring of their alliance. He would risk the safety of the Named Lands for his son and do so without shame. Fatherhood redefined love in a way that Rudolfo had not thought possible.

Still. Rudolfo shuffled through the papers one last time, then retied the string that held them together. Standing, he stretched and picked up the packet.

Adjusting his green turban in the small mirror, he let himself into the corridor and slipped two doors down, tapping lightly on the wood surface. He heard the bed creak and footsteps approaching.

It opened slowly and Charles looked out. “Lord Rudolfo,” he said, inclining his head.

Rudolfo returned the nod and smiled. “Are you rested? I had hoped to speak with you for a bit.”

The old man held open the door and stepped aside so Rudolfo could enter.

The room was like the other cabins he’d seen about the Kinshark, small but well ordered. A bookcase, a throw rug from the silkworms of the Emerald Coast, a small desk and a narrow bed.

“Please sit,” Charles said. He closed the door behind them.

Rudolfo pulled the wooden chair out from the desk and sat. The old man still looked haggard, but Rudolfo imagined he should after so long in Erlund’s care-and before that, Sethbert’s. He handed the stack of papers to Charles. “These are from your hidden Pope,” he said. “There are some surprises here for me.”

The Arch-Engineer untied the string and scanned the first few pages, his face paling as he went. He moved quickly to the bottom of the stack.

“They’re coded,” Rudolfo said. “When we return to the Ninefold Forest, I’ll ask one of the mechoservitors to decipher it.” His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward. “But I would ask you now: Is it true?”

Charles went back to the beginning and started again. This time, his eyes moved a bit slower. He shuffled