and stand on an equal footing with every other landowner.'
'Ah, well, then.' Mingsley leaned back in his chair and rested his hands contentedly on his belly. 'That is what you should have told me first. If voting and control of the town are to be based on land ownership, then we New Traders have nothing to fear.'
'Certainly, that is true. Once you legally acquire some land, you, too, will be allowed to vote on the Council.'
He went red, and then his face darkened until she feared he would collapse. When he spoke, the words burst from him like steam from a kettle. 'You have betrayed us!'
'And how did you expect to be served? You betrayed the Satrapy once, luring Cosgo to issue grants to you that you knew were illegal. Then you came here, and further betrayed Bingtown, by dirtying its shores with slavery and undercutting its economy and way of life. But that was not enough for you. You and your cohorts wanted it all, not just the lands of Bingtown, but the secret trade of Bingtown.'
She paused for a sip of tea, and to smile at him. 'And for that you were willing to betray the Satrap into death. You would have used his slaughter as an excuse to let the Chalcedeans kill the Bingtown Traders, so long as you could keep their wealth for yourselves. Well, you were betrayed once, by the Chalcedeans. How that astonished you! But you did not learn. Instead you sought to bend me as you bent the Satrap, not with wealth but threats. Well. Now you are betrayed again, by me. If betrayal you would call it, that I stand up for what I have always believed in.'
In a very reasonable voice, she continued, 'New Traders who labor alongside the Three Ships folk and the slaves in helping to rebuild Bingtown will be granted land. That the Bingtowners themselves decreed, with no prodding from me. It is the best offer you will get. But you will not take it, for your heart is not here. It never was. Your wives and your heirs are not here. Bingtown, to you, was a place to plunder, never home, never a new chance.'
'And when the Jamaillian fleet arrives here, what then?' he demanded. 'The birds that were sent out to Jamaillia primed them to expect Old Trader treachery against the Satrap. Lo and behold, we were more right than we knew! Your Bingtown Trader friends were the ones who sent the Satrap to his death.'
Her voice was cold. 'You are so bold, you admit your part in the plot against Satrap Cosgo, and then threaten me with the consequences?' She shook her head in patrician disbelief. 'If Jamaillia were going to muster a fleet against us, it would have done so by now. Unless I am much mistaken, those who hoped to sail north and plunder Bingtown have found they must stay at home to protect what they have. If this threatened Jamaillian fleet ever arrives, I doubt there will be much to it. I assure you, I am all too familiar with the financial state of the Jamaillian treasury. The death of a Satrap and the threat of civil war will prompt most nobles to keep their wealth and their strength close to home. I know what the conspiracy hoped. You believed your Jamaillian partners would arrive with ships and turn Bingtown over to you. Doubtless you thought it wise to have this fallback defense against the Chalcedeans in case they became too greedy. As they did, and far sooner than you expected.'
She gave a small sigh and poured herself more tea. With a social smile, she waved the pot questioningly toward Mingsley's cup, then interpreted his outraged silence as a refusal. She took up her lecture again. 'If this fleet ever arrives here, they will be greeted with diplomacy, a cordial welcome and a well-fortified harbor. They will find a city rebuilding itself after an unjustified Chalcedean attack. I suggest you consider the New Traders' position in Bingtown from an entirely different angle. Whatever will you do if the Satrap is not dead? For if the dragon speaks truth when she says that Malta Vestrit lives, then perhaps the Satrap has survived alongside her. How uncomfortable could that be for you? Especially as I have it, in your own hand, that there was a New Trader plot against him. Not that you were personally involved, of course.' She idly stirred a bit of honey into the mint tea. 'In any case, if the fleet is met, not with a show offeree, nor a scene of civil disorder, but with a courteous and diplomatic welcome… Well.'
She cocked her head at him and smiled winningly. 'We shall see. Oh. Did I caution you to remember that this Jamaillian fleet must first come here through not only the Pirate Isles, but through the Chalcedean 'patrol' vessels? It will, I think, be rather like coming past an enraged hive of bees. If and when the fleet reaches us, they may be glad of a peaceful harbor and a dragon guardian.' She stirred her tea again as she idly asked, 'Or had you forgotten about Tintaglia?'
'You will regret this!' Mingsley told her. He stood with a fine crash of china and cutlery. 'You would have been carried alongside us to power! You could have returned to Jamaillia a wealthy woman, and lived out your days in civilization and culture. Instead you have doomed yourself to this backwater town and its rustic folk. They have no respect for the Satrapy here. Here you will be nothing more than just another woman on her own!'
He stormed from the room, slamming the door behind him. Just another woman on her own. Mingsley was not to know that he had flung a blessing at Serilla in the tones of a curse.
KENDRY CAME BACK TO HARBOR UNDER SAIL, A DIMINISHED CREW WORKING HIS decks, but making good time nonetheless. Reyn Khuprus sat on the skeletal rooftop of a half-destroyed warehouse and watched him come. Overhead, Tintaglia circled once, flashing silver. The dragon touched Reyn's mind briefly as she passed overhead. 'Ophelia is your name for her. She comes, also.'
He watched Kendry as the men brought him alongside one of the shattered docks and tied him off. The liveship had changed. The affable boyish figurehead did not wave his arms in greeting, or clap and whoop with joy at his safe return. Instead his arms were crossed on his chest and his face was closed. Reyn could guess what had happened. Tintaglia had told Kendry who and what he truly was. The last few times he'd sailed on the Kendry, he had been uncomfortably aware of the dragon lurking below the ship's surface personality. Now those memories would have bloomed in full.
A slow and terrible knowledge rose in Reyn. He was doomed to see this change in every liveship. With each stricken or closed face, he would have to confront what his ancestors had done. Knowingly or not, they had taken the dragons' lives from them, and then condemned their spirits to a sexless, wingless eternity as ships. He should have been happy to know that the liveship Ophelia had prevailed in her encounters with the Chalcedeans. Instead, he did not want to be there when Grag Tenira went down to greet the ship he had loved all his life, and encountered a glowering dragon instead. It was not only dragonkind he had injured; soon he would see in his friend's eyes the damage done to Bingtown's liveship families.
Too many changes, too many chances, he told himself. He could not sort out what he felt anymore. He should have been joyous. Malta was alive. Bingtown had formed a solid alliance and had a treaty ready for the dragon's mark. The Chalcedeans were vanquished, at least for now. And sometime in the future, if all went well, there was another Elderling city for him to explore and learn. This time, he would be in charge, with no plundering or hasty robbing of treasure. He would have Malta at his side. All would be well. All would be healed.
Somehow, he could not trust it to be real. The brief sensing of Malta that he had received through Tintaglia was like the aroma of hot food to a starving man. The possibility of her was not enough to satisfy the longing in his heart.
At a noise in the building below him, he glanced down, expecting to see a stray dog or cat. Instead, he saw Selden picking his way through the rubble below. 'Get out of there,' he called down in annoyance. 'Can't you see this whole roof could fall on you?'
'Which is why you're sitting on it, obviously,' Selden called up to him, unimpressed.
'I just needed a place where I could look out over the harbor and watch for Tintaglia to return. I'm coming down now.'
'Good. Tintaglia's gone to groom, but soon she'll return to make her mark on the scroll the Council has drawn up.' He took a breath. 'She wants the Kendry immediately loaded with supplies and engineers and sent up the river so her work can be begun.'
'Supplies from where?' Reyn asked sarcastically.
'She doesn't much care. I've suggested that she should begin with the Kendry just taking builders up there, stopping in Trehaug to pick up folk who know the ways of the river, and then going to the place she wants dredged. They must see what needs to be done before they plan how to do it.'
Reyn did not ask him how he knew so much. Instead, he came to his feet, and picked his way back to the eaves of the building. The winter sun woke the glints of scaling on Selden's brows and lips. 'She sent you to fetch me, didn't she?' Reyn asked as he made the final jump down. 'To make sure I'd be there?'
'If she wanted you there, she could have told you herself. No. I came myself to make sure you would be
