Of Dawn and Darkness (The Elder Empire: Sea Book 2) (7 page)

The sight sent a note of guilt thrumming through his gut. He had been focused on his own pain, his own tragedy. He’d forgotten about Jerri. She had been taken along on his plan, caught up in the summoning of an Elder and the destruction of Imperial property. While he was being tried by the Emperor, she must have been sick with worry, left with no idea what would happen to him.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “This is my problem, not yours. You should go back to your family.”

Jerri looked at him, eyes wide in evident surprise. “And miss the
Aion Sea?
”

That reminded him: she had been eager to attempt a jailbreak, delighted at the appearance of the Lyathatan, and just as angry at the Emperor as he was.

She, at least, didn’t blame him for the disaster that had ruined their lives.

He couldn’t have faked the smile that split his face in that moment. “I should have known better.”

~~~

Waiting for them on the deck of
The Testament
was a dark-skinned Heartlander man in a pristine white suit. His white pants were freshly pressed, his white shoes polished, and his white hat round and wide-brimmed. A silver pendant gleamed around his neck: the White Sun, symbol of the Luminian Order.

Calder paused halfway up the ramp to his ship, staring. A Luminian? The Empire had sent a Luminian Pilgrim as his babysitter? He had already assumed that the Imperial officer would make all his decisions for him, but he had never imagined that they would come with a sermon on the side.

“Andel Petronus, pleased to meet you,” the man said, unfolding a sheet of paper. “And you would be Calder Marten.”

“What gave it away?” Calder asked, running his hand over his head. “Was it the hair?”

Andel ignored him, reading off the top of the page. “Calder Marten, in the name of the Aurelian Empire and with all the authority of the Emperor himself, you are hereby placed under my custody until your obligation to the crown is paid. Until such time, you are required to...”

The man in white stopped reading, folding the paper back up and slipping it into his pocket. “Essentially, I get to do whatever I like.”

Jerri gave Andel a flattering smile. “And how much is that debt, exactly?”

“Five thousand goldmarks,” Andel said, with no expression one way or another.

Jerri made a choking sound. “Five thousand? That’s absurd!”

“You’re right,” Calder said, then he turned back to address Andel. “Why isn’t it ten? The Emperor said this was a ten-thousand-goldmark ship.”

“Apparently the Blackwatch declined to formally register charges against you,” Andel said. “Leaving you burdened only with the cost of an Imperial prison.”

That was more than he’d expected, and he likely had his mother’s influence to thank. “Fair enough,” Calder said, nodding.

Andel nodded back. “Anything the Emperor chooses to do is the definition of fair treatment.” There may have been a taste of irony in those words, but it was hard to tell. Judging by his face, he seemed completely serious.

Jerri looked from one of them to the other. “That’s more than all of us will make in a lifetime.”

“Then I expect we’ll get to know one another quite well,” Andel said, adjusting his sleeves. “Think of me as part of the ship.”

“I choose to think of you as the anchor,” Jerri said lightly.

“I can see that,” Calder agreed. “Over the side with you.”

Unfazed, Andel pulled another paper from his other pocket. “Think of me as the part of the ship that tells you where to go and what to do at all times. Today, we are awaiting,” he looked down at the paper, “a package of considerable size, to be delivered to a gladiatorial arena in Izyria.”

Calder perked up at that. At least he would be performing actual duties as a Navigator, not simply being held prisoner on his own ship. Surely there was something on the Aion that could ensure his eventual freedom.

“How long does this trip take?” Jerri asked.

“Two months total, there and back again,” Andel said. “For an experienced Navigator with a crew. For you, I would say four months. Maybe five.”

For one trip?
Calder had never done anything in his life for five straight months. He was afraid he’d go insane in a week. Besides which...

He glanced around him. He could feel the ship like an extension of his skin, feel the seamless dark green deck beneath him, the towering presence of the mast supporting a green-veined sail, the splash of water cradling the hull. He felt it, but he had very little idea how it was supposed to work. He’d be lucky to make it out of the harbor.

Then again, he was a Soulbound now. All Soulbound were supposedly capable of great feats. He would figure it out.

“What about the pay?” Calder asked, striking at the subject most near to his heart.

“Fifty goldmarks, on receipt of the package,” Andel recited. “They were generous. At this rate, it will only take you thirty years to pay off your debt.”

A crippling weight settled onto Calder’s shoulders.

“Lighten up,” Andel said, with a tone that suggested he was telling them to scrape barnacles. “There are worse fates than thirty years of arduous labor.”

Calder looked around the deck in a daze. He had participated in the construction of
The Testament,
binding its pieces together into one cohesive whole, but the ship had never seemed so cramped as it did now. For the rest of his life, this would be his world.

From beneath them, a surge of timeless resentment boiled up into his mind. The Lyathatan, bound by invested chains and sworn into service, seemed incapable of contentment. So not only would he be trapped onboard a ship, he would be accompanied by a bound Elder whose loyalty would last only as long as its vaguely defined term of service.

Besides which, he had little idea how to actually work as a Navigator. What supplies would they need for a four-month journey? Would they be able to pick up food in Izyria? He could steer, but how would he find his way to the correct destination?

Calder wished he could keep up his conversation with the Imperial officer, to show this Andel Petronus that it was Calder’s ship and
he
would give the orders.

Instead, he stood on the edge of the deck, lost.

It wasn’t like him. He had always thought of himself as the one to take action, who was never at a loss for something to say or do. And now the sheer enormity of the future overwhelmed him.

Andel turned toward him, hat gleaming in the sun. He studied Calder’s face with no apparent change in expression.

“While you were still sleeping in the palace, I had the ship loaded. We are now carrying twelve barrels of fresh water, two cauldrons, a set of pots, four canvas flags with the Navigator crest, two rifles with matching ammunition, three quicklamps, and almost a thousand pounds of food. Mostly beans, rice, cheese, and salted meat. There are three Navigator supply stations in the Aion, and we can stop and resupply at each of them, if necessary. I have their locations logged.”

When he finished his speech, Andel tipped his hat. “It’s in my own best interests to see to the success of this ship, after all.”

Calder took what felt like his first full breath of air all day. The relief made him feel ten pounds lighter; he even smiled at the man in white. “Well done, Andel. I may have spoken too hastily with you earlier. Welcome aboard my ship.”

Andel ran his hand along the railing and held it up, as though inspecting his fingers for dust. “Until your debt is cleared, Mister Marten, this is
my
ship.”

~~~

Calder and Jerri spent the rest of the day preparing for their new life, under the direction of Andel Petronus. For one thing, they needed to retrieve clothing and personal effects from their family homes.

Alsa Grayweather, Calder’s mother, was not in residence. The servants let Calder into the house, but they only had a vague idea what had happened to her, and the rumors were sending them into a panic. Calder had to convince one valet that he hadn’t escaped from the Imperial Palace, as the man worried that Calder was on the run from the law.

He left his mother’s home with a trunk of clothes in one hand and a shrouded birdcage in the other. The staff was only too eager to be rid of
that.

The fate of his mother chewed at him, burdening him even more than his own future. He was sure she wouldn’t be held legally complicit in his actions, as she was a Guild member in good standing, but he still didn’t know what the Emperor would actually do to her.

But she wasn’t at home. He needed to ask Andel; maybe he would know something.

Calder pushed through the crowd leading up to the harbor, Candle Bay stretching out behind
The Testament
like a deep green field. On the left shore, a pile of rubble spilled onto the rocks, as though an avalanche had swallowed up a hospital. Crews of workers scurried like beetles over the debris.

He tore his eyes away from the remnants of the Candle Bay Imperial Prison and back to his ship. Then he had to check the name on the hull, to be sure it actually
was
his ship.

There was a huge cage sitting on the deck, and two men standing around it.

Calder walked up the extra-wide, reinforced ramp that they must have built for the sole purpose of carrying the cage onboard. He supposed they had wheeled it up, considering the cage was big enough to hold a pair of grown lions. Its bars were rough steel, and its base and roof were both made of close-fitting planks of thick wood. No one would be strong enough to carry it.

Then again, if anyone could do so, it would be these two.

One of the men was sun-tanned and weathered as though he had spent his life aboard a ship, his dark hair worked into a hundred tiny braids. His right eye was covered by a rough leather eyepatch, and he carried a hammer at his belt.

At first glance, it looked like a craftsman’s claw hammer, but it caught Calder’s eye. He peered at it for a moment before he noticed the details that didn’t quite fit: the metal was smooth, not nocked as a used hammer would have been, and the handle almost seemed to crawl with twisting shadows. When he recognized the flow of Intent, his eyes widened.

The boy’s only friend is the hammer. When he sleeps, the hammer is clutched in his fist. When he is attacked—and he is always attacked—the hammer defends him. He smashes legs, arms, skulls with the hammer until it feels natural, until the crunch of shattered bones is the music of his life. A Kameira looms large among its victims, a slithering creature of liquid and shadow, but somehow it’s not just a victim…it’s one with the hammer, part of it, merged together…

Calder blinked his eyes free of the vision. If he wasn’t mistaken, he’d just witnessed the intentional creation of an Awakened weapon. And, very possibly, a Soulbound.

The one-eyed man saw Calder looking at the hammer and grinned. He ran a thumb down the head of the hammer, preening.

His partner was utterly pale, as though he’d never spent a day outside, and had his hair cut short. This man didn’t carry a weapon, but he had a broad shield strapped to his back. Calder didn’t bother to focus on it; he could feel the Intent bound in the object clearly enough that he didn’t need a closer look. Another Awakened weapon.

Both men bulged with muscle. Once, Calder had gone to see what the news-sheets
called a “spectacle,” a live performance with trained animals and talented performers with rare skills. A strongman had twisted an iron bar into a knot with nothing more than his bare hands, though Calder had suspected that someone had invested the bar beforehand.

Even that strongman would have fled from these two. They looked like they would have an easier time tearing another man’s arm off than shaking his hand.

The one-eyed man stuck a hand out. Calder didn’t hesitate before dropping his trunk of clothes and taking the hand; he was afraid that the man might take any reluctance as an insult.

“You must be the young Navigator,” the man said, and broadened his grin. “Word is, you broke out of an Imperial prison and walked away with a brand-new ship.”

Calder did his best to match the man’s smile. “I wasn’t breaking myself out.”

He laughed like Calder had told a joke. “Well met, Navigator. We’ll get along, I can tell. You can call me Nine.”

Calder turned his attention to the man with the shield. “And you, sir?”

The pale man didn’t seem to notice that Calder had spoken. He kept his eyes on the cage.

“You’ll have to forgive Eight,” Nine said. “He’s picky.”

Eight didn’t clarify.

“Eight and Nine,” Calder said. “There aren’t seven more of you, are there?”

Nine chucked easily and rapped his knuckles on the bars. “We’re not supposed to use our real names on this trip. Not sure what the point is. You may have noticed that we have a little trouble blending in.”

It had been a busy, even catastrophic few days. That was how Calder justified it. There was no other explanation for why he hadn’t noticed the gold crest that each man wore pinned on his shirt.

A small, golden pin marked with the image of a crown.

The Golden Crown: symbol of the Champion’s Guild.

Calder couldn’t stop his eyes from widening. How had he not noticed before? There were a pair of Champions on his deck. Real, living, Imperial Champions.

On
his
ship.

No Guild had made more of an impact on Imperial history than the Champions. All the ancient writers spoke of them. Loreli, the original strategist:
“If you may hire a Champion or persuade one to your cause, then victory is certain. Otherwise, heed my teaching.”

Heliora, the Witness who chronicled the Kings’ War:
“I stood motionless from sunrise to sunset, watching the armies clash, recording every maneuver and every feint of one general against another. Then the Champions arrived, and I left, for the battle was over.”

Sadesthenes, the great historian and philosopher:
“If all men were Champions, there would be no war, for such a conflict would be too great and terrible to consider.”

Nazin, the hero of
A Tragedy of Sand and Tears
:
“I am not a Champion, my love. I am but a man.”