Of Dawn and Darkness (The Elder Empire: Sea Book 2) (17 page)

Which didn’t exactly answer his question, but it was likely the closest he would get. Calder removed the servant’s uniform, the one that had been waiting for him earlier, and quickly pulled it on. His skin was tacky with blood, so these clothes would be ruined, but he didn’t care. He felt too vulnerable without anything on.

This will be the third set of clothes I’ve destroyed since I arrived here.
An idle thought, but almost enough to make him laugh.

“That explains how you were nearby, but you actually saw an intruder and saved my life. That’s not your job.” In fact, he wouldn’t have been surprised if her job was the exact opposite.

She frowned at him. “Right now, my job is to keep the Optasia out of the hands of the Elders. That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it?”

“Trust me, I don’t want Elder tentacles on the throne any more than you do.”

Meia turned back to survey the hallway through the cracked door. “Then we’re on the same side.”

As Calder finished buttoning up his red-and-gold jacket, he considered Meia. Over the last month or so, since he’d found out that Consultant assassins were after his life, he’d thought of the Consultant’s Guild as heartless, bloodthirsty monsters who were only
pretending
to serve their clients.

Now, he was reminded of the Consultants as he’d always heard of them. The most loyal Guild in the Empire; the only one that had always, through the past two thousand years, had the Emperor’s complete trust. Everyone knew a Consultant would guide you and help you, and would remain utterly dedicated to your cause...for the duration of their contract.

More than one of the great classical philosophers had words of praise for the Consultants. If he could get one on his side, even if the rest of their Guild opposed him, that could be a huge advantage.

A distant door slammed open, and booted feet pounded down the hallway, toward Calder’s room. Meia eased the door shut, sliding away and over to the window. “Imperial Guards. They’ll take you somewhere safe.”

“Wait!” Calder called before she vanished. She froze, one foot on the open windowsill. “Why leave?”

She looked at him like he was asking why she sharpened her knives. “For the same reason I disappeared aboard your ship. Our Guilds are in conflict, and maybe soon open war. If they catch me here, they’ll try to take me into custody, and I’ll have to kill them.”

The boots were closer to his door now, and raised voices had begun to call his name. He motioned for her to stay where she was. “Stay there. Don’t leave.”

She gave him a doubtful look.

“Trust me. Please.”

He walked to the center of the room, casually putting himself between the door and Meia. If he wasn’t mistaken, they would jump to conclusions any second now.

Sure enough, a Guard with massive lion paws for feet kicked the door in a second later, brandishing a musket and bayonet in his hands. He looked past Calder and gave a shout, leveling his gun.

Calder showed his empty palms. “Lower your weapon, Guardsman.”

“Move out of the way, sir!” the man shouted, stepping forward as though to move Calder physically out of the way.

Calder walked into him voluntarily, so that the bayonet rested at the end of his chest. The Guard jerked the weapon away hastily. “This woman saved my life.
He
tried to kill me.” He jerked his thumb toward the Champion’s corpse.

More Guards poured into the room, and two immediately checked the body for vitals. “Slit throat,” one said.

“Champion,” the second responded.

“Good point.”

Together, they drew swords and hacked the limbs from the man’s body. Shivering, Calder turned away. “Excuse me, my friend and I would like to be taken somewhere else. I’m not feeling particularly safe in here, for some reason.”

The Guard’s gaze hardened when it moved over Calder’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, sir, we need to ask her some questions. Standing orders.”

“Why’s that?”

“She’s a Consultant, sir. One of the enemy.”

“Ah, I can see your confusion.” He stepped back, presenting Meia with one arm outstretched. “She’s not a Consultant at all. She’s a Navigator. A member of my crew, in fact, my new...cook.”

Meia’s eyes were back to a human blue, and she stared at him as though she could focus hard enough to Read his Intent. Maybe she could; was she a Reader? He had no idea. But if she was a Reader
and
a trained assassin
and
a warrior with enough enhancements to fight toe-to-toe with Urzaia Woodsman, that just wouldn’t be fair.

The Guard looked uneasy. Calder took advantage, pressing him while he was uncomfortable. “Let’s go, Guardsman. Lead me and my cook to safety.” He held a hand to his temple against a throb of sudden pain. “And a medical alchemist, as soon as possible. I’d like to kill this pain yesterday, if that can be arranged.”

While the Guard was uncertain when faced with Meia, he knew exactly what to do with an injured ally. They practically carried him down the hall, sending for the palace alchemists, and Meia followed.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Nine years ago

Half a year after delivering Urzaia to the arena, Calder was finally starting to learn his way around the ship. He could furl the sail without tangling it nine times out of ten, and he could steer his way through a predatory coral reef without putting his hand on the wheel.

More importantly, Jerri had taken to the work of a pilot—she scanned the horizon, charted their course, studied their position by the stars, and logged whatever deadly creature or impossible phenomenon they encountered during the day. She enjoyed, as she called it, “planning a safe route through an endless maze of horror and death.”

Calder had even grown used to the two monsters in his life: the Lyathatan and Andel. The Elderspawn, it turned out, existed in a perpetual state of malice and burning frustration. It had very little to do with anything Calder did. So long as he allowed the creature to snag the occasional shark and otherwise let it sleep, he and the Lyathatan remained on good terms. He still got the impression that it was plotting something ominous at all times, and that its service to Calder was but one step in some insidious game, but he was beginning to realize that its game wouldn’t end for another few centuries at least. He couldn’t bring himself to care about that.

Andel was a little trickier to handle, in some ways. The problem was, he was just too
useful.
He tended to assume responsibility for every problem as soon as it arose, so he would often have fixed whatever-it-was before Calder was even aware. This undermined his authority in the eyes of the passengers, so Calder tried to take charge whenever possible.

But having a crew member who was
too
skilled was a good problem to have, especially when the total crew numbered precisely three. Calder conducted most everything related to the handling of the ship himself, but passengers still ended up working for the duration of their journey.

Except this passenger.

Mr. Valette looked like a schoolteacher. He was thin as a fence post, with expensive spectacles and long gray sideburns, and he had a tendency to frown at Calder as though expressing deep, heartfelt disappointment. Only one thing ruined the impression: his long, black coat.

He refused to work, refused even to acknowledge it when Calder asked him to carry a box or tighten a line. He would simply frown and walk away. The passenger seemed to spend most of his time scribbling in a journal, which he kept tucked away in the inner pocket of his coat.

Two weeks into the journey, Calder finally mustered up the courage to ask his passenger a question. “If you’ll pardon me asking, Mr. Valette, what does the Blackwatch need in the town of, ah...” He had to glance down at the log to remember the name of their destination. “...Silverreach?”

Mr. Valette slapped his journal closed, glaring at him. “I would pardon you asking, Captain Marten, but I doubt my Guild Head would do the same. She would be irritated with you, in fact. If you had ever met her, you would know how terrifying a prospect that is. So let’s keep our questions to ourselves, hm?”

Calder still had nightmares about his first meeting with Bliss, but he couldn’t admit that to this Watchman. Valette wasn’t the only one who preferred to avoid sensitive questions. “That’s understandable, Mr. Valette, and thank you for the warning. But considering the nature of your business, this information could affect the safety of everyone onboard. I wouldn’t want to run into any trouble with Elderspawn, after all.”

The passenger scratched at one of his sideburns, considering this. “I do not anticipate trouble,” he said at last. He slipped the journal into his coat, rising to his feet. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be in my cabin. The weather does not look like it will be kind to ink and paper.”

Calder glanced up to the stormclouds, which rolled in a slow, spiraling whirlpool. There
was
a storm on its way, but it wouldn’t be likely to harm his book. Clouds like those meant that the rain would come in reverse.

He headed over to Jerri, who was slumped over the ship’s wheel, an expression of absolute boredom on her face.

“I’ve seen two fish today,” she said, as he approached. “One of them ate the other.”

“Looking for lives of excitement and adventure? Join the Navigators!”

She smiled out of the corner of her mouth. “At least it looks like rain today. That’s the only difference from yesterday.”

“And we won’t even get wet.” He leaned against the railing next to the wheel, watching her. “What do you think of Mr. Valette?” he asked, voice low.

“Reclusive and shady, like every other Watchman I’ve ever known. All of them. No exceptions.”

“No wonder they kicked me out. So you don’t want to know what’s happening in Silverreach?”

Jerri looked out over the sea, her eyes narrowed. She began to tap her fingers, drumming a rhythm on the ship’s wheel. Just when Calder was about to break the silence, she spoke. “I’ve...read about Silverreach before. Somewhere.”

It wasn’t too surprising that Jerri would have read something he hadn’t, but he hadn’t thought Silverreach was that significant of a town. “Is it famous?”

Her eyes flicked to him and then back to the horizon. “Not famous. But if I’ve heard about it, something must have happened there. We should do some research.”

Calder thought about the pathetic four books they kept on the entire ship. “By ‘research,’ you mean...”

“We should steal Valette’s journal.”

That was more like Jerri. Rather than wasting time feigning surprise, he nodded. “How?”

“The easy way,” she said, flipping her braid over one shoulder. “Wait until he’s asleep, take the book out of his coat.”

Andel thunked a barrel down onto the deck loudly, attracting their attention. “I thought you should know we had a beetle problem. Half of the barley will have to be thrown overboard, and we’ll have to filter the quicklamp fluid.”

Calder nodded to the barrel. “Is that the barley?”

“The beetles,” he said. “They tried to mutiny, so I had to quell their rebellion. Show them who owns this ship.” The lid of the barrel started to surge upwards, as though something inside was pushing its way out, until Andel sat on it. Seated comfortably on the barrel of beetles, Andel pulled his hat off and began fanning himself. “So what’s this I hear about a theft?”

Calder and Jerri didn’t look at each other before they spoke. They’d worked together long enough that they reacted immediately.

“We were planning to rob you,” Jerri said.

Calder let out a sigh. “Wait until you were asleep, go through your coat, take away all your...valuables.”

Andel looked at them calmly from his perch on the barrel, still fanning himself with the hat. “Not my precious valuables.”

“Now that you’ve heard us, our plot has been foiled,” Jerri said. “You’ve beaten us again.”

Calder stared into the water, filling his gaze with regret. “We never should have opposed you to begin with.”

“That’s true,” Andel said. “Without me around, you’d be face-to-face with Kelarac before we ever caught sight of shore.”

It was common for sailors to reference Kelarac when referring to the bottom of the ocean, because everyone knew that was where the Soul Collector was sealed. But Calder couldn’t help a shudder. Ever since he’d
actually
met Kelarac, the phrase had become more than just an expression.

“And it’s good that you were planning to rob me, instead of our passenger,” Andel went on. “As we wouldn’t want the Blackwatch finding out we had any breaches of conduct. Not only would they feed us to Elderspawn, they wouldn’t pay us.”

The barrel under him shuddered, the beetles struggling to escape, but Andel didn’t seem to notice.

Calder forced a smile, but his hands were clenching on the railing. Whenever he started to get used to having Andel Petronus around, the man had to get in his way. Where was the harm in a little book-snatching? He’d been brought to trial for worse.

Andel reached into his white jacket, pulling out a palm-sized, tightly bound book of his own. He waved it in the air, then tossed it to Calder. “Fortunately for you, I don’t like sailing in the blind any more than you do.”

Jerri leaned over the book as Calder opened it. The first line read,
“To my Guild Head, Bliss, from your servant Andrei Valette...”

From a quick scan of the page, it went on to describe his plan of action when he reached Silverreach, including his predictions about what
The Testament
’s crew would do on shore.

“You copied his journal,” Calder said. His forced smile had slipped away, replaced by naked shock.

“I used to work as a scribe for the Order. All I needed was a few minutes a day before and after I laundered his coat. He’s fastidiously clean.” Andel didn’t even look proud of himself. He sat there with an expression of absolute calm, even as the beetles surged underneath him.

Calder held up the book. “Well done indeed, Mr. Petronus. Please take the wheel while we study this in my cabin.”

“I’ve already read it,” Andel said. “So I won’t spoil the surprise. Surrender the helm, and I’ll see if I can bring us back on course.”