The Stars Asunder: A New Novel of the Mageworlds (4 page)

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Authors: Debra Doyle,James D. Macdonald

BOOK: The Stars Asunder: A New Novel of the Mageworlds
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“Vai!” said Thel. He glanced automatically at the antique clock on the landing above him, an old-style devotional timepiece whose complex analog interior allowed its multiple dials to show the phases and movements of the moon as well as the current hour. There would be time to speak with Vai and still keep the moonwatch—excellent. “Where is she now?”
“She waits in the reception room, my lord.”
“Good. Instruct the kitchen to bring some light refreshment.”
“I hear, my lord,” said the
aiketh,
and floated off.
Thel hurried back down the stairs to the reception room where Iulan Vai waited. She was a compact, deceptively quiet woman, dressed as usual in a tailored black overtunic and black leggings. When he’d first met Vai, Thel had attributed her taste in clothing to a streak of austerity in her temperament, but over the passage of time he’d decided that she dressed in black mainly because it allowed her to hide better in dark corners.
Iulan Vai was the syn-Grevi family’s eyes and ears in Hanilat. Thel’s father, before he died, had paid for her training and seen to her placement in that position. Theledau had his own theories about the reason why. Vai was a decade or so younger than Thel, but like him—and like, also, the elder syn-Grevi in his prime—she had fair skin, and hair of a reddish-brown so dark that in most lights it appeared as a rusty black. Thel had offered her formal adoption into the syn-Grevi a number of times since their first meeting, as part of the customary advancement for someone who had served the family more than well, but Vai had always refused the honor.
When he came into the room, she rose from the chair where she waited, and knelt.
“My lord sus-Radal,” she said.
Thel opened his mouth to correct her, and then thought better of the idea. Iulan Vai dealt with only the latest, most accurate information. If she addressed Theledau syn-Grevi as the head not of a minor north-country line but of the entire sus-Radal fleet-family … then the unthinkable had happened, and it was true.
“Don’t do that,” said Thel. “We’re not in somebody’s mansion in Hanilat.”
Vai rose gracefully to her feet and resumed her chair. “No, my lord. But you’ll get there.”
“How did it happen?” he asked. “We were never all that close to the primary line.”
“Close enough for old Jofre to pass over the whole bundle of senior lines and pick you to succeed him.”
“He was mad,” said Thel, with conviction.
“Mad as a mortgaunt,” Vai agreed. “Disinheriting people was a hobby of his. Every time he felt his stomach twist or his bones ache he’d call in the legalists and start scratching out names. Only this time, he died before he could change his mind back again. The sus-Radal are yours, my lord.”
A kitchen-
aiketh
floated in bearing a tray of spiced wafers and two glasses of sweetroot cider. Thel waited until Vai had made her choice, then took the remaining glass. The cider was cool and tart, with a natural sweetness and a hint of fizz. Thel had never heard of it being made or sold anywhere outside the far north country. In the old time, it wouldn’t have kept in the subtropical temperatures of Hanilat; these days, he supposed there just wasn’t a demand for it.
“You’re right,” he said after a while. “I’m going to have to leave syn-Grevi Lodge and go to Hanilat. The fleet won’t accept me otherwise.”
“The city’s not so bad. You’ll get used to it.”
“Maybe,” he said. He picked up one of the spiced wafers and bit into it, turning the full circle into a crescent with a couple of bites. “Vai … I want you to come work for me in Hanilat.”
She gave a faint laugh. “I thought I already did.”
“You worked for the syn-Grevi,” he told her. “I want you to leave the syn-Grevi behind you and work for the head of the sus-Radal.”
 
Year 1116 E. R.
 
ILDAON: ILDAON STARPORT
ERAASI: WESTERN FISHING GROUNDS
 
T
he search for gloves took longer than ‘Rekhe had expected. The street signs were all in the local alphabet, presumably because traders from Eraasi came only once or twice a year, but cargo flyers and trucks arrived daily from all over Ildaon. Fortunately, most of the signs also had pictorial symbols, though the meanings were not always what ’Rekhe would have anticipated. After going down a number of false trails, he and Elaeli came to a three-story building about a mile from the hostel. Upon inspection, the building proved to be a roofed-over concourse housing several major emporia and a host of smaller shops.
Inside, the building was warm. ‘Rekhe unclenched his fists and let the heat start thawing out his fingers. He and Elaeli were the only members of the
Ribbon’s
crew inside the concourse. The bright blue and crimson of their garments stood out in vivid contrast to the drabber colors favored by local fashion, and the ambient murmur of voices had the unfamiliar pitch and rhythm of an unknown language. ’Rekhe felt disoriented and conspicuous at first, but realized after a while that nobody in the big high-ceilinged building was paying him any particular attention. With relief, he applied himself to the search for a pair of gloves.
His liberty-companion, he discovered, was inclined to be thorough about such things. Left on his own, ’Rekhe would have bought the first non-disgraceful gloves that happened to fit—in this case, a pair made of dull black leather lined with soft fabric, on sale at a small men’s-haberdashery kiosk just inside the main door. Elaeli would have none of it. Undeterred by the lack of a common language, she inspected the stock of every merchant in the concourse with a pair of gloves to sell.
The gloves she ultimately bought came from a large emporium on the top level of the concourse. ’Rekhe could distinguish only minor differences between those gloves and the ones he had seen earlier—black fabric instead of grey for the lining, and stitching done with a heavier thread—but when Elaeli professed herself satisfied at last, he shrugged and purchased a similar pair for his own use. The price, when he translated it from local money to fleet scrip, made his eyebrows go up; he hadn’t expected something that small to be so costly.
“Don’t worry,” Elaeli reassured him. “They’ll last forever, and that’s what’s important. Haven’t you ever bought gloves before?”
“No,” he said. “I grew up in Hanilat, remember? It doesn’t get cold like this in Hanilat.”
And his sister Isayana—or the
aiketen
she had built and instructed—had always purchased the family’s food and clothing anyway. But ’Rekhe didn’t intend to pass along that kind of information to Elaeli Inadi. It might cause her, for some reason, to think less of him, and that was something he already knew that he did not want.
 
 
“You’ve done well,” said Captain Soba. He and Narin stood on the port wing of the pilothouse, looking back on a deck running with fish guts and salt water.
Dance-and-be-Joyful’s
crew swung the boom inboard with another dripping load and dumped the fish out onto the deck for processing. In the aftermath of the Circle’s working, the sun had continued hot and the skies clear every day for a week, while the crews of the fishing fleet labored to bring up the plentiful catch and stow it in the holds below.
“Well ended, when ended,” Narin replied formally, to ward off luck-breaking—but she grinned as she said it.
“We’ll have full holds by nightfall,” Soba told her. “More than a season’s catch. And after that it’s homeward bound.” He clapped Narin on the shoulder. “It’s a feat to tell the youngsters about—from a bare beginning to the best year that I can recall, and all in less than a week.”
“You can buy me dinner in Amisket after we sell the haul,” Narin said. “In the meantime, I’ll be below if you need me.”
“Bring more of that luck back topside with you,” Soba called down to her as she descended the ladder.
“I’ll try, Cap’n.”
Narin headed aft along the port side of the main deck to the companionway. When she looked away to windward off the port beam, two other fishing ships were visible—miles off, but hull up, plying their nets and lines. All across the broad expanse of ocean the swells were long and low, with wavelets dancing across their surface.
While she paused there, gazing outward, the vista changed. A long dark line appeared on the horizon, a boundary drawn with black ink between the sea and the sky. Within minutes the dark boundary wasn’t a line any more, but a solid grey-blue wall, growing higher and racing across the water with frightening speed. A pale streak at the bottom of the wall marked where rain and wind whipped the ocean into foam.
Narin stood, all thought of going below abandoned, and watched the wall of cloud draw closer. In all her years at sea, she had never seen a squall line move so fast. She estimated its speed of advance at forty knots or more.
Other members of the
Dance’s
crew were watching the onrushing squall and not liking it any better than she was. In the pilothouse above and behind her, she heard the Captain giving orders to the helmsman—“Left full rudder. Increase your rudder to left hard. All ahead two thirds.”—and farther aft, the chief rigger shouting to the crew—“Get your load on deck! Fuck the winches, cut the burton!”
Narin held onto the gunwale with both hands, her fingers clamped to the wood, as the front came on. The
Dance
was coming left to try and take the blow on the bows, but the trawler had been moving too slowly, her engines only making enough turns to pull the nets; she wasn’t going to swing in time.
Then the wall hit them.
The wind slammed into the ship’s side like a fist, whistling and tearing at the rigging, and
Dance-and-be-Joyful
heeled to leeward so far that her spar ends touched the water.
Another moment, and the squall was past. The sun shone again. The ship righted itself, rocking in the churned water, while the wall of mist continued on beyond them. The waves were choppy and confused, and patches of foam showed on the side of the swells.
Big Tam emerged from the deckhouse and joined Narin where she stood looking at the wall of mist and whipping wind as it raced away. On this side of the squall the air felt thicker, and the quality of the light had altered. Everything looked sharp-edged and brittle, like painted glass that a touch might shatter.
“What was that?” her Second asked.
Narin shook her head. “I don’t know. Some kind of squall line.”
“Kas didn’t say anything about foul weather-luck.”
“Luck can change in a hurry,” Narin said. “And so can weather. Let’s find Kas and see if she’s got anything more to say now.”
They didn’t have far to look. Kasaly herself was coming up on deck in bare feet and a thin sleep-robe—the squall must have caught her napping.
“That was a bit more wind than we needed,” she said. “Are we going to have to do something about it, do you think?”
“I was about to ask you that,” Narin said.
“I don’t know.” Kas frowned at the ocean. “All I can tell you is that this is lucky weather.”
 
 
By the time ’Rekhe and Elaeli made their way out of the concourse, night had fallen over the starport. Street lamps at the corners of the city blocks threw overlapping circles of yellow light that didn’t illuminate the upper levels of the surrounding buildings. At least in this part of town, the Ildaonese didn’t believe in illuminated signs. Except for the concourse itself, most of the establishments appeared to have closed at dusk, and one low, square building looked much like its neighbor.
“Are you sure we’re going in the right direction?” Elaeli asked after they had walked for several minutes.
’Rekhe thought about saying that he was sure, then thought better of it. “I’m not even certain we left the concourse by the same door we came in,” he said truthfully. “Without enough light to pick out the landmarks, it’s hard to tell one street from another.”
“I think the port is that way,” Elaeli said. She pointed with one newly gloved hand toward where the night sky appeared somewhat brighter. “I saw lights around the field that looked like they might be on after dark.”
“If that’s what we’re seeing now.” ’Rekhe had a dubious feeling about the skyglow. There was luck attached to it somehow, loose looping strands of good and bad fortune that cried out to be taken in hand and managed properly. The sensation made him uneasy. He wished that he hadn’t given in to his brother Natelth’s insistence that he serve out an apprentice-voyage first, before leaving for the Circles. “Maybe we shouldn’t go there.”
“Why not?”
He groped for the right words. “Something will happen if we do.”
“Something will happen if we don’t, too. Things happen everywhere. And if we stand here much longer, what’s going to happen is that we’re going to freeze.”
He couldn’t argue with that. The temperature had dropped markedly with the falling of Ildaon’s sun, and the wind had gotten brisker. Even with his new gloves, his hands and feet were cold, and the skin of his face felt numb.
“Toward the light, then,” he said. “If worst comes to worst, maybe we’ll find someplace open where we can ask for directions.”
They continued onward through the deserted shopping district, past buildings with empty, darkened display-windows and in and out of the circles of light from the street lamps. No transit-for-hire vehicles cruised this part of town at night, probably for lack of custom. ’Rekhe saw no other pedestrians, and the few trucks and private groundcars that rumbled past were clearly on their way to business elsewhere. He feared vaguely that, alone as they were, he and Elaeli might offer an attractive target for footpads and hooligans, but no menacing figures slipped out of dark cross-alleys or loomed up from the shadows of a recessed doorway.
After a while the illumination ahead grew brighter. The street they were following opened up into an avenue lined on both sides by street lamps in close-set rows, and by buildings with locked doors. This part of town wasn’t as dead as the one they’d wandered into after leaving the shopping concourse, but it didn’t appear to be open for business either.
Their footsteps tapped on the sidewalk, and the echoes bounced off the deserted buildings. The exhalations of their breath showed white under the street lamps.
Elaeli moved closer to ’Rekhe. “I guessed wrong, it looks like. This isn’t the way to the field.”
“No.” ’Rekhe’s ears caught the low growl of a groundcar’s engine. Further up the street, lights flashed white and violet and amber. “If that’s a bus, we’ll ask the driver how to get to the starport.”
Elaeli looked dubious. “We don’t speak the language. He may not understand.”
“He’ll see the fleet colors,” ’Rekhe said. “That should be good enough.”
Elaeli made a doubtful noise and pulled the collar of her cloak higher around her neck. The engine sounds grew louder in the street behind them, and the white lights drew closer. When the vehicle drew even with them, ’Rekhe saw that it was not a bus, but a private groundcar.
The vehicle slowed, then stopped opposite them. One of the rear doors swung open. ’Rekhe tensed—perhaps this part of town had thugs and criminals after all—but the voice that called out spoke in Hanilat-Eraasian.
“Hey, sus-Peledaen! You going to the port?”
“Yes,” ’Rekhe said.
“Then you’re going the wrong way—jump in and we’ll give you a ride.”
 
 
Narin got to the
Dance
’s pilothouse just as Orghe, the vessel’s chief rigger, was making his own report on the effects of the squall. She held back and let him speak; the rigger was a master at his own craft, and at the moment he looked worried.
“Cap’n, the starboard vang’s torn away.”
The Captain frowned. “How long will it take you to make repairs?” “It’ll take us a day to fix it right,” Orghe said. “Or I can have something juried for you in an hour, either way you please.”
“I want to top the catch and head for port,” Captain Soba said. “I’ve talked with the other skippers of the fleet by wireless, and they agree.” He glanced over at Narin. “That is, if our Circle doesn’t have any word against it.”
Narin shrugged. “Kasaly says this is lucky weather.”
“Call up the weather display,” Captain Soba said.
The
Dance
’s quartermaster punched the repeater. A map came up on the pilothouse screen displaying the west part of the Veredden Sea. A list of numbers along the right side showed the local data from
Dance-and-BeJoyful’
s position.
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Soba said. He hit the reload button to bring in the latest data from the weather satellite system. “All clear. It was a fast squall, nothing more.”

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