Dark Empress (34 page)

Digging deep into the well of her being, she was a little surprised to find that the sudden appearance of someone once beloved from her past had almost entirely failed to move her. Once the initial shock had faded, rather than fascination or a desire to catch up, what she found herself wondering was how she could use Ghassan to her advantage?

The greater surprise had been that the realisation that she was truly that shallow and quite possibly now incapable of love, empathy or sympathy had not, in fact given her any cause for concern. Not only had her soul hardened to diamond, cold and impervious, but she was at ease with the fact. Life was a game and needed to be played to win.

Finally, uncomfortably, Ghassan broke the silence.

“I’m so sorry about your father.”

“Mmm?” Asima looked back from the sea, her wandering thoughts sharply reeled in and shut away where they could be contained and protected.

“I asked around and he’d lived well after you left” Ghassan continued. “He was looked after, but an illness of the gut settled in and the doctors could do nothing.”

Asima frowned again and shook her head, changing the subject.

“And what of you, Ghassan? Why the navy?”

The tall, curly haired captain shrugged.

“A series of unpredictable choices. Samir and I both vowed to free M’Dahz and kill the satrap, but I think Samir knew we wouldn’t agree on how. I went to join the army and then turn them on M’Dahz. Samir left me and ran away into the criminal underbelly of the town.”

He sighed.

“And now M’Dahz is free, and I wasn’t even involved. All my plans to launch a rescue for the town and its fate was decided by politicians a thousand miles away. I would feel deflated, but it’s just not the all-consuming goal it once was. The military’s given me purpose and, now that it’s part of the Empire again, it feels like I’m helping to build something.”

Asima nodded sagely while actually only half listening.

“And I’ve persuaded the governor of Calphoris to request extradition of Satrap Ma’ahd for his unwarranted invasions and executions. Given the alliance between us now and Ma’ahd’s involvement in the coup, I’m sure the new king will agree, and then I’ll go collect him myself and deal with him in public.”

Asima looked up and was impressed at the cold viciousness she could see in his eyes. Ghassan was about to be sorely disappointed.

“You may have a little trouble there.”

Ghassan narrowed his eyes.

“What?”

“I’m afraid Ma’ahd won’t be sent here. He is not imprisoned by Ashar. He never got the chance.”

The young captain stared at her and she sighed, putting on her most sympathetic mask.

“If it’s any consolation to you, I can tell you two things. One is that he died horribly. He suffered from beginning to end, and was never buried, but cast from the city walls in Akkad. His remains lay on the rocks by the sea until they were eaten by scavengers.”

She noted a certain satisfaction settle over him. This could easily play to her advantage.

“And secondly, it wasn’t during the civil war. He died at my hands in revenge for what he did to all of us. One of us did it, Ghassan. It wasn’t you, but it might as well have been.”

She smiled at him as she watched a mixture of disappointment and righteous satisfaction war for control of his face. It was a lie, of course; revenge had not even figured in her motivation. She’d have been quite glad never to set eyes on M’Dahz again, but it would have been a plausible motive, had she any use for morals and nostalgia.

“He died badly then?”

Ghassan’s voice sounded almost pleading.

“Very. In fact, if you wait, I have a gift for you.”

The young captain frowned and watched as Asima unfolded her legs and wandered across to her bags. She began to mutter to herself quietly as she delved into one and produced, after much rummaging, a small purple pouch of velvet and gold. Returning to her seat, she sat once more, crossing her legs, and clicked open the catch on the pouch.

Upending the container, she held her hand beneath to catch the two things that fell out, wrapped in silk and tied with a delicate gold ribbon.

Her face grave and serious, Asima passed over the two small parcels, one crimson and one aquamarine. Ghassan frowned at the items in his hand.

“Open them” Asima urged, pocketing the pouch.

Ghassan chose the smaller of the two parcels, gently untying the ribbon and unwrapping the blue silk. He stared down at the object within the folds of shiny material. A ruby the size of his thumbnail stared back up at him, cut, shaped and immaculate, and representing more than a year’s pay for anyone on board.

“What is this?”

Asima smiled and there was something about the expression that Ghassan wasn’t sure he liked.

“It’s a pommel jewel. I took it from the hilt of Ma’ahd’s sword when I’d finished removing his head with it. Call it a keepsake.”

Ghassan stared.

“This is worth a fortune, Asima. You might need this in Velutio.”

She laughed, but the laugh had an edge.

“Ghassan, you really don’t know me at all, do you? That is a bauble; a mere bead compared with some of the precious stones I liberated from their imprisonment in Akkad. I could buy this ship with one jewel, and not even the largest one.”

Her smile vanished instantly.

“Though I trust you will honour my wishes and keep their existence a secret?”

Ghassan frowned at her and then nodded.

“I think you’ll maybe like the other one more” she added.

His frown still in evidence, the captain began to unwrap the second parcel and almost dropped the contents as they fell into his hand, causing him to lurch in surprise.

From within the red silk, a gleaming white, fleshless bone finger pointed accusingly at Asima.

“What?” he managed, his voice hoarse.

“Another little souvenir. It’s his; Ma’ahd’s.”

“You kept his finger?”

Asima laughed and once more Ghassan was unnerved by her expression.

“Better. I kept the whole hand for a while.” She smiled wistfully. “But I had to trim things down and travel light when I left Akkad, so I just kept a couple of fingers for luck.”

The captain stared at his passenger and then shook his head in a mixture of disbelief and revulsion. He suddenly felt so alone. He’d been looking forward to a chance to talk with Asima; to catch up on the events of so many years and now he found that she was far from the person he remembered. She had hardened; become cold and vicious. He found himself thinking of Samir and his life of crime and murder and wondering how, of the three children that had raced across those dusty rooftops so long ago, he seemed to be the only one that had reached adulthood with a sense of morals and principles of which their parents would be proud.

He frowned again. Asima had not flinched at the news of her father’s death. She had not brought up the subject of Samir; not even asked where he was or what he was doing. Ghassan realised with a start that any trust he had in her had evaporated in the past few minutes, and he began to feel for the unsuspecting nobles of Velutio who were about to have this calculating woman dropped upon them.

“Ghassan?”

He looked up and realised that Asima was watching him.

“I’m sorry, Asima. Thank you for thinking of me, but I don’t need these gifts and, I’m afraid, I don’t really want them.”

He turned and gestured at her with a waved hand.

“Have you lost touch with who you were so much that your father’s death is meaningless? You’ve not even asked after Samir…”

Asima shrugged.

“I would have got around to it. One thing at a time, Ghassan. To do anything well, you must prioritise.”

She stood and started to walk around the room, waving her hand to accentuate her words.

“I am Asima, Ghassan. Maybe not Asima the poor merchant’s daughter from M’Dahz, but the lady Asima, wife of the former God-King of Pelasia, first woman of the harem and, until recently, the most powerful woman in Pelasia.”

She pointed an accusing finger.

“You expect me not to change in almost twenty years, Ghassan? You have changed, so why not me. I had to survive and, in the name of all that remains, I did so and I did it damned well!” Her voice had dropped to a hiss.

“And Samir? Of course I know about Samir. That ship of his is as infamous in Pelasian waters as it is in yours. And he always did think faster than you, Ghassan. That’s why he’s still out there. How many times have you tried to corner him? How many times did you think you had him before he slipped out of your grasp like water from a leaky cup.”

She snarled and slapped her hands down on the table.

“I do what I must, Ghassan. So does Samir. Only you are so weak that you hide behind your flags and regulations as you flounder around, unable even to catch your brother with half the world’s military power behind you.”

She fell silent, staring down at the table. She appeared to focus on something for a moment and then her mood changed like a sudden squall. She glanced sidelong at the stony face of the now bitterly angry captain; the target of her tirade.

“I’m sorry, Ghassan.” She gave him a weak smile. “I’ve had a tough time and life is not very easy for me at the moment. I shouldn’t take it out on you. Forgive my harsh words.”

Ghassan continued to glare at her as she returned her gaze to study the map on the table beneath her hands. An interesting archipelago lay between her thumbs and this, if she was reading this correctly, was looming in her near future. She turned to regard Ghassan again and the captain straightened.

“Thank you for you time, lady Asima. I shall not disturb you again until the evening meal is prepared. Rest well.”

Without a word, he cast the bones and the jewel onto the bunk and, turning, strode from the room, allowing the door to shut with a loud bang behind him. Asima sighed. Had she gone too far? She needed him distant, but not too distant. New plans… new plans within plans. Now where was that archipelago?

In which Asima makes her presence felt

Asima peered from the viewport in the side of the room. She had been alone most of the time since her ‘conversation’ with Ghassan when she came aboard, the only interruption being the delivery of her meals by one or other of the crew. Apparently the captain fell disinclined to join her to eat, but that was better for Asima anyway. It had taken around an hour and all of her considerable mental faculties to fathom the arcane naval charts on the table, plot the distance to the archipelago, estimate the ship’s speed and therefore how long it would be until they reached the string of small islands. Having embarked on the afternoon tide, the Wind of God should pass the archipelago in the middle of the second night.

The interminable hours alone in a small, bare room were then mostly spent irritably tutting as she went through all her packages. It had been galling enough when she left Akkad stripping so many years of her life’s acquisitions down to three large cases. Now she realised it would have to be just one, and preferably the bag, which was easily transportable. Refining what she needed and what she could realistically do without was a task of several hours on its own.

Finally there had been the time spent listening to the orders and the heavy footsteps above and outside, peering out of the door and along the corridor to the deck when she felt she needed more information. To work out routines and schedules by sound alone was a difficult task, but Asima had achieved more during her time in the harem.

The first night had been very informative with respect to the crew’s night time schedule. The second morning, she had braced herself and left the room, ostensibly to stretch her legs. Ghassan had glared at her when she appeared on deck and had assigned one of the oarsmen to escort her. She had made a great show of enjoying the sea air, stretching and relaxing, and had shown an interest in the workings of the ship, as she would no doubt be expected to. In fact, she was very interested, but only in certain aspects. How sails were set or oars were stored was of little value to her. Other parts…

And then she had retired to her cabin once more to settle in for the day and finalise her plans. The hours had passed tensely for her as the naval vessel bounced lightly across the waves on its journey to the great city that was the centre of the Empire and the start of her life of imposed exile in obscurity.

Now, the moon was bright and shining down on the water, making the waves glitter and dance, which worked both for and against her plan, but then she could hardly control the heavens. Squinting out to the horizon, she confirmed what she thought she saw a minute ago. Marked on the charts, ‘eagle rock’ was one of the standard naval navigation markers and stood at the near end of the closest island in the archipelago. She smiled to herself. Predictably, ‘eagle rock’ was identifiable from here, rising aquiline above a low spit of sand.