The Ships of Air (The Fall of Ile-Rein) (5 page)

Giliead took his arm, looking it over carefully. Ilias continued, “But they have traitors, people who have sworn themselves to the Gardier like the one who betrayed us on the island. Some captured Ander and Florian and nearly killed them before we came back here.”

Halian nodded, impatient. “That’s to be expected in a wizard’s war like this.” He stepped closer, his face serious. “I know you weren’t there long, but did they seem the kind of people we could ally with?”

Ilias stared at the floor. He didn’t like this all being on his head; he didn’t want to mix what he wanted with what Cineth, let alone the whole Syrnai, should do. In his gut he thought the Rienish would make good allies; better than the Hisians, who made treaties only for the pleasure of breaking them and thought everybody who looked odd was a wizard. He told himself it wasn’t just because the Rienish, like the woman who had come to the door, never saw his curse mark for what it was and that he liked being looked at like a man again. “All I can tell you is that they treated me well.” Glancing up at Giliead, he added, “And it wasn’t like the places here that fall under wizard’s rule.” They had both seen what could happen to a village or town taken over by a wizard: the people cursed into obedience and treated like slaves. There were towns past the Bone Mountains in the dry plains where wizards had held sway for generations, and the inhabitants were little better than cattle.

Giliead eyed Halian. “You’re thinking of what to advise Nicanor and Visolela.” Nicanor was Halian’s son by his last marriage and now lawgiver of Cineth with his wife Visolela. It would be their decision whether to recommend the alliance to Cineth’s council or not, and whichever way it decided, the rest of the city-states in the Syrnai were likely to follow.

“We need an alliance.” Halian pressed his lips together. “What they’re doing now is just helping shipwrecked travelers, no more than any other civilized people would do. But when the Gardier return for vengeance we’ll truly need their help.”

Ilias shook his head regretfully. “They haven’t been able to help themselves. When we left, their cities were falling,” he said, trying to be honest. “But their god-thing can fight the Gardier in ways we can’t. We’d be better off with their help than without it.”

Halian looked at Giliead. When the cities of the Syrnai sent a representative to foreign lands, it was usually a Chosen Vessel, but they all knew this was different. “You agree?”

Giliead nodded, as if he had already made the decision sometime ago. “Yes.”

Ilias took a deep breath. He had gone with Giliead to the Chaeans and to other lands, but he had the feeling that going with the Rienish would take them even further.

Halian leaned back against the wall, his face grave. He knew what this decision could mean. “Then we need someone to speak for us with them. Would Tremaine be a good choice?”

“She’d fight for us.” Ilias snorted. “And I don’t think she knows how not to fight dirty.”

Giliead’s mouth quirked. “That’s true.”

“All right.” Halian stepped back, nodding to himself. This wasn’t his first wizard war by a long stretch; Ilias just hoped it wasn’t the last one for all of them. Halian already looked worn down and older than Ilias was used to thinking of him.

Giliead must have had the same thought. “Get some rest,” he suggested.

Halian nodded wearily, clapping Ilias on the shoulder as he went back into the room. Ilias and Giliead looked at each other, then Giliead jerked his head down the hall, back toward the stairs. “I want to see what they did with Ixion.”

Ilias nodded. He was tired, his head hurt from the storm and his scars ached, but he was too keyed up to sleep. Besides, it was their job to make sure there were no curses lying in wait so the place was safe for ungrateful bastards. As they started down the corridor, he said, “I’m going to kick the shit out of Dannor.”

“He’s an idiot,” Giliead agreed grimly.

Dannor wasn’t really an idiot and they both knew it, but Ilias was tired of his word being disregarded as worthless because of the curse mark. All his other years of experience at finding and killing wizards aside, a sane person might think that someone who had actually been cursed and survived would be the best judge of what was safe and what wasn’t.
It’s not as if you didn’t ask for it
, he reminded himself. He took a breath, trying to look at it in perspective. “He was right.”

Giliead gave him a sour look. “If you say that again I’m going to kick the shit out of you.”

Caught by surprise, Ilias glowered back at him. “You think?” he said dangerously. They stopped, facing each other, but just then two Rienish women came into the corridor, and they had to step apart to give them room to get by. By the time the women had passed, glancing at them with nervous curiosity, the mutual urge to relieve their feelings by pummeling each other had faded. Still glaring at each other, they reached the room with the big staircase again and started up.

At the first landing Ilias stopped to get a better look at the Rienish-style painting mounted on the wall, forgetting his pique entirely. It showed a woman in a midnight black gown slashed with bloodred silk, a glitter of icy gems on her breast. She was sharp-featured but beautiful, with red hair coiled elaborately around her head. She was seated surrounded by a group of young men all in dark rich clothes, with long hair and beards. He had come across this kind of art when he had gone to Ile-Rien with Tremaine, Florian and Ander, and it was different from any type of painting he had ever seen before. “Look how they do this. It makes the people seem so real.” He stepped closer to look at the brush-strokes.

Giliead put a hand on his shoulder and drew him back, adding matter-of-factly, “There’s curses in that.”

“Really?” Ilias fell back a wary step, startled. “Tremaine said the paintings didn’t use curses.”

“The ones in those rooms she took us to didn’t. This one is different.” Giliead held his hand over it, not quite touching it, frowning in concentration. “It doesn’t feel dangerous. I don’t think it was meant to be a trap. It’s very old. Maybe it was painted by a wizard and his curses just…leaked into it.”

“Oh.” Relieved, Ilias stepped close again to examine the woman’s image. “Maybe that’s the woman the ship is named after.” She looked like someone that would make Visolela feel threatened and defensive, so Ilias immediately wanted to like her. He jerked his chin toward the men gathered around her. “She had a lot of husbands.” Warrior-husbands. They all wore swords, strange-looking ones with long narrow blades and rounded guards to deflect the sharp points. No one had worn swords when he had been to Ile-Rien, but he knew all the warriors must have been away fighting the Gardier.

Giliead nodded, studying the woman thoughtfully.

They went on up, finding the big room where they had first boarded less packed with people but still crowded, everyone babbling in unfamiliar languages. Ilias recognized some of the freed slaves by their ragged brown Gardier clothes. From here he could see there were round columns of polished green stone flanking colorfully patterned carpets and more of the cushioned furniture. There were glass-walled rooms along the sides, though they seemed to be empty.

“I don’t see Gerard.” Giliead let out his breath, sounding both resigned and annoyed. “This is going to be like looking for a pebble in a quarry. Any ideas?”

“No…. Wait, there’s somebody.” Craning his neck, Ilias saw a familiar sleek blond head bobbing through the crowd and started forward, shouldering his way through. It was the other wizard, Niles.

“Hey,” he called when he was in earshot. “Niles.”

The man turned, a little startled, and eyed them dubiously.

“We need to find Gerard,” Ilias said. He was annoyed to find himself speaking slowly, as if that would help. The only word the man would recognize was the other wizard’s name.

Niles lifted his brows, enlightened, and motioned for them to follow, turning to head for the opposite end of the big chamber. It was easier this time because people had noticed them and were moving aside, mostly so they could stare. It didn’t bother Ilias since he had done his share of that in the Rienish city. And it wasn’t unfriendly staring, like the Gardier or when he and Giliead had traveled to an enemy city or port; it was just honest curiosity.

Niles led them to the back of the big chamber, down a short corridor where the tile floor turned to rich green carpet. It opened into another stairwell, this one gently lit by cloudy glass panels in the walls, each etched with graceful waterbirds and plants. They went up a couple of decks, through an empty carpeted chamber, then a metal door that led to another stairway, this one narrow and without the colorful appointments of the others. The walls here were just the bare metal bones of the ship and as they went up Ilias caught the scent of damp outdoor air, as if a hatch was open somewhere. He wondered how far they were above the water. “How do you steer something like this,” he said softly. It must be like trying to steer a floating city.

Giliead shook his head slightly. “The steering platform has to be in the bow.”

“But how does that work?” Ilias protested. They came up into a short passage with four doors and Niles chose one, stepping inside. Ilias looked cautiously past him, seeing a room with wooden walls unadorned except for two small windows looking out into a cloudy gray sky. In the corner there was a long cabinet with narrow drawers, very like the one where they had found the maps inside the Gardier’s flying whale. The men in the room were leaning over a big table spread with maps and papers, studying them intently. Permeating the air was the strong odor of that awful drink the Rienish seemed unable to live without. The Rienish sailors had identical clothing the way the Gardier did, but instead of dull brown they wore short dark blue jackets with bands of red on the upper arms, the front decorated with small round ornaments of bright metal.
The color of their clothes can’t be the only difference between them and the Gardier,
Ilias thought, feeling a little uncertain in spite of himself. He glanced up at Giliead, whose brow quirked, as if he was thinking the same.

Then past the other men he saw Gerard, leaning over the table and looking reassuringly ordinary in his Syprian clothes.

“Gerard,” Ilias said in relief.

“There you are.” Gerard straightened up. He spoke to Niles for a moment in Rienish, then adjusted the pieces of glass he wore over his eyes and switched back to Syrnaic to ask them, “Everything all right? Oh, this is the shipmaster, Captain Marais.”

One of the other men glanced up, studied them with sharp attention, nodding as Gerard repeated their names. Ilias was surprised to see how young he looked, though his face was reddened and weathered from long experience at sea.

Giliead nodded to the man, then asked Gerard, “Where’s Ixion?”

“Ah, yes.” Gerard’s expression hardened as it always did at any mention of Ixion. It was one of the reasons Ilias trusted him. “We’ve got him stowed away in a specially warded chamber. Would you like to see it—him?”

Giliead let out a breath and glanced at Ilias. “Not really, but I should anyway.”

“How do they steer this ship?” Ilias asked, only partly wanting to delay the visit to Ixion. He was really curious.

“Ah…” Gerard looked around absently. “I can show you the wheelhouse, it’s right up here.”

In Rienish he spoke to the captain again, who nodded and waved them on. Gerard stepped to the half-open hatch in the far wall.

They followed him into the next room and Giliead stopped so abruptly in the doorway that Ilias stepped on him. A little wary, he peered past him to see a big room, the opposite wall lined with large square windows.

Green-gray sea stretched out in all directions and they were so high in the air the heavy clouds seemed almost within reach. Ilias had seen the view from the bow before but they were higher up this time; in daylight, even the half-light of the storm, it was far more breathtaking. “A floating mountain,” Giliead said softly.

The two men in the room turned to look curiously at them but didn’t object to their presence. One stood before the center window, holding on to a wooden wheel mounted on a post. Gerard exchanged a few words with the other, who nodded and made an expansive welcoming gesture.

Giliead moved further inside, still caught by the view, and Ilias followed him, looking around. There wasn’t much there he understood the use for except the windows. The other sailor stepped to one of the waist-high white pillars that studded the floor, taking hold of the lever that sprouted out of the top and pushing it forward. Baffled, Ilias glanced at Giliead, who shrugged slightly to show he had no idea either.

Gerard noticed and explained, “Those are the engine telegraphs. They’re used to communicate the helmsman’s instructions to the engineers in each of the four main engines.” He indicated the squiggles on the pillar’s side that might be writing. “Slow, full, stop, and so on.”

Ilias exchanged a look with Giliead. Some of those words hadn’t meant anything, but he thought he had caught the gist of it. It was more evidence that what all the Rienish were saying was true and that the ship didn’t really use curses to sail. Wizards—the wizards they knew anyway—would have just cursed these men below to do whatever they wanted. Not require them to read their orders from signal flags or whatever these things did.

Gerard nodded to the man holding the wheel. “The helmsman steers from there. At the moment we’re on a sort of zigzag course to avoid any Gardier airships that might be accompanying the gunship. Our advantage is that we’re much faster in the open sea.” He pointed to two glass boxes set above the center window. “That indicator shows the course heading, the other one shows the angle the rudder is making with the ship.”

“You steer with that?” Giliead’s expression was doubtful.

Gerard smiled wryly. “Yes, it’s a little daunting to know that a ship of…Well, of however many tons is being guided by that. Supposedly it can be moved with one finger.”

“She sheared off the end of the dock when she left port,” Ilias told Giliead. “And smashed a house.”