Deadly Games

specializing inunderwater operations.”

“You want us to steal a ship?” Maldynadogaped at her. “Oh, Books is going to give you an extra hard timefor that. He was whining when you just wanted the suits.”

“Actually,” Books said, “if the owners ofthis vessel are all dead, I believe Maritime Salvage Law would bein effect.”

“What?” Maldynado asked.

Amaranthe grinned. “Finders keepers.”

“You mean we get to have our own ship?”Akstyr asked. “Nice!”

“Maldynado,” Amaranthe said, “want to comefind the engine room with me? See if things are in workingorder?”

“A tour through a part of the ship likely tobe littered with more corpses? Nice of you to think of me.”

“You could stay and help Books with thesuits. Of course, I’d have to leave him in charge since he’s theunderwater adventuring expert.”

“No, thanks.” Maldynado headed for the door.“Last time he was in charge, he forced me to swim naked in glacialwater.”

A trapdoor in the center of the corridor ledinto the bowels of the ship. Amaranthe climbed down a narrowladder, descending into a tight space crowded with machinery.Nothing clanked or whirred, and the cool temperature promised thefurnaces had been dormant for some time. The air smelled less rankdown there, though a faint singed odor came to Amaranthe’s nose,reminding her of a smelter.

At the bottom, she took a step, lifted herlantern, and halted. “Uh.”

Maldynado dropped down behind her.“What?”

She pointed at a contorted lump of metal thatresembled melted candle wax. “That’s the engine.”

“It’s, ah…” He touched an amorphousprotrusion that might have been a flywheel once. “Hm.”

“A brief but sufficient description.”

Maldynado walked around the contorted mess.“It’s melted right into the deck. You couldn’t even replace it witha new engine.”

“It looks like someone wanted to make surethis ship didn’t engage in any underwater adventures while it wasin town,” Amaranthe said. “If they saw it come into port, theymight have seen it as a potential threat. Even if the treasurehunters had no inkling of what lay below, someone could havechartered the boat and used it as a base of operations forinvestigating.” She rapped a knuckle on the warped engine. “And, ifthis ship was a target, it stands to reason the Saberfistcould be one too when it comes into port. We haven’t had good luckdealing with Mancrest, but maybe we should warn him that hisbrother’s ship may be in danger.”

A clank answered. Maldynado had wandered tothe far end of the engine room and was poking at a lock on a castiron box set into the floor.

“Are you listening?” Amaranthe asked.

“Huh?”

She sighed. Maldynado or Books would call hercrazy for missing Sicarius’s company, but he always listenedwhen she rambled on, speculating about their enemy’s actions.

“Do you think we should warn Mancrest thathis brother’s ship could be in danger?”

Maldynado snorted. “I wouldn’t worry about amilitary vessel. The marines can take care of themselves.”

“Against practitioners?” Amaranthe noddedtoward the melted engine again. “I suppose it’s possible some sortof acid did this, but it seems more likely the mental sciences wereinvolved.” She thought of Akstyr’s bug incineration trick above.She had seen him create a flame to light a candle, too. There mustbe an entire field devoted to heat and energy.

But Maldynado had turned back to the lock anddid not respond.

“What’s so fascinating?” Amaranthe squeezedpast a knot of pipes and joined him.

“This is warm.” He perched on a small stoolbolted to the deck next to the two-foot-by-two-foot box. Rivetssecured the corners, steel hinges fastened the lid, and a padlockhung from a sturdy steel loop.

Amaranthe touched the cast iron. A faint heatwarmed the coarse metal. She checked to make sure the key was notdangling on a hook nearby, or something equally obvious, beforefishing her lock-picking set from her pocket. “Scoot over.”

“Ah, yes,” Maldynado said. “Books mentionedthat you’d acquired that skill from Sicarius.”

She selected a pick and a torsion wrench andbent over the lock. “Did he mention it in a tone of chagrinnedconcern for my deteriorating morality?”

“Yes, but isn’t that his usual tone for allof us? And the world in general?”

After a few minutes of wrangling the pinsinto submission, the lock clicked open. Amaranthe hesitated,thinking of Books’s advice. “It’s imprudent to open a strange boxthat may be booby-trapped with magic, isn’t it?”

“How magical can it be? It’s part of aTurgonian ship.” Maldynado removed the lock and shoved the lidopen.

No explosions threatened to sear off theireyebrows. Good. Amaranthe peered inside, almost bumping heads withMaldynado.

A bronze-and-iron rectangular device restedinside. Two small bars-handles? — stuck out from the ends, levers anddials dotted the sides, and a red, multifaceted glass knobprotruded from the top. There was no bottom to the outer box, andthe device appeared to sit on the deck, but something beneath itkept it from resting flush.

Amaranthe tapped one of the handles. Whennothing happened, she risked grabbing both sides and lifting. Acollapsible pipe linked the bottom of the device to the deckbeneath it, and she had no trouble raising it three feet. Two roundconcave pieces of glass set in the side closest to her made herthink this was something one looked into. She was about to try itwhen the knob on top flared to life, emitting a soft crimsonglow.

She dropped the device. It clunked back tothe deck, but nothing untoward happened.

“That’s definitely not standard Turgoniantechnology,” Maldynado said. He had relinquished the stool to herand crouched at her side, his shoulders fighting for space amongstlevers and gauges protruding from a control panel beside him.

“Maybe the Tuggle has been outside ofimperial waters and acquired tools to help in its trade,” Amaranthesaid. “Could this be some sort of underwater version of theTurgonian periscope? Like the ones used on army trampers for seeingover trees and brush? Only this one lets you see down into thewater?” If so, that might be just what they needed. “These knobsand levers could be controls for rotating it and raising andlowering it.”

“You’re an imaginative girl.”

“Is that good or bad?” she asked.

“Mind if I wait to pass judgment until afterwe see if you get us blown up by playing with that thing?”

After giving the glowing knob a wary squint,Amaranthe pulled the device up again and leaned her face in so shecould peer through the glass eyepieces.

Blackness greeted her. She fiddled with theknob, which she could raise, lower, twist, and push in differentdirections. The view wavered, but she still couldn’t seeanything.

“Because it’s the middle of the night anddark down there,” she realized. “Drat.”

Amaranthe started to draw back, but hersleeve caught on a small lever beneath one of the handles. Itclicked. A beam of light shot out from somewhere beneath theviewing display, and it illuminated the water.

“There we go,” she murmured. The blue-paintedhull of the ship came into view, taking up most of the rectangulardisplay. Not sure which lever or knob to push, she started with thehandles themselves. The box twisted, altering her view below.“Ah.”

Turning the periscope allowed her to see toeither side around the bottom of the ship. Nothing more interestingthan a couple of fish and the wavy green algae on the dock pilingscame into view.

“I wonder if this can go down deeper,” shemused.

“Am I supposed to respond to your mutterings,or are you simply talking to yourself?” Maldynado asked.

“It depends on whether you have an idea.”

Maldynado pressed on the glowing knob.

Bubbles of water streamed past the displayuntil the view vanished in a swirl of sand followed bydarkness.