The Fox

  Jeje shrugged off the existence of the capital list for a moment. Inda?

  She glared at Testhy, jaw jutted, her brown eyes so wide he could see the whites all the way around.

  “I can’t believe Inda is a coward, or whatever it was those stupid Marlovans said. It’s impossible.” Her voice was already low—she sounded like one of the fellows if you didn’t see her speak—but now it was so husky she seemed to be growling. “But I guess I’m not surprised he’s some sort of lord. He knows too much. I mean about reading and history. You hear about how princes and princesses get armies of tutors and servants and things. But none of that matters now. What is important is if the Khanerenth navy did send ships, they’ll kill our friends. Except Inda, who will be a prisoner given to the Venn.”

  “That seems to be it.”

  “Based on the lies Ryala Pim told.”

  Testhy scratched his head again, tiredness and the flood of giddy relief after the shock of his near escape making his mind foggy. No one had bothered to come out of the back room to wait on them. The few other mariners at the other plank tables sat drinking or talking in low voices. “Seems to me that the Venn won’t care about the ships. They want Inda. Rank. Marlovan. It would mean something if the Venn tell the Marlovans they have him.”

  “That’s politics, all right,” Jeje said in disgust. “You know it as well as I do; Inda’s been with us since our rat days, and he was too small to have fouled the hawses of kings and land battles and the like. Not on his own. The whole thing sounds like an excuse for politics of some kind, and it makes my gut boil!”

  “But that’s in Iasca Leror, clear on the other side of the world.” Testhy turned up his palms. “It hasn’t anything to do with you or me here and now. Seems to me our first job is to find a new berth somewhere. New name—at least for me.” Snake’s hiss . . . He winced. “I don’t even know where to start.”

  “And give them up as dead?” Jeje muttered in that low growl. “You heard what that first mate said. They could be alive. Alive, and forced to act as pirates.”

  Shock, relief, now anger. “He’s a lieutenant. In navies they have ranks.” Testhy twisted his lips. “You’re still trotting behind Taumad’s shadow?”

  Resentment made Jeje hot. She struggled against a nasty retort. “No. I’m not. It was Inda I was thinking of. And Tau, too. Mates—they are our mates, all of them. Kodl, who’s been a good first mate since we were all rats on the Pim ships—he looked out for us, always. Dasta who never wears a jacket. Dun the carpenter, too, even though he didn’t talk much. And the new crew—Rig making us those cinnamon rolls as long as we don’t expect him to ever be a baker for real. Thog, always quiet. Ready to work. Wumma and his carvings. Don’t you feel like they’re a-a—” She groped, fingers poking the air. Family wasn’t the word. She had that at home. Lovers wasn’t right either, though she’d had only one tumble with dear Yan, but that memory would stay secret and precious.

  Testhy actually met her eyes for a moment, but in the way his eyelids lowered and his shoulders hitched up, Jeje understood that he didn’t believe her about their being mates. Again she felt resentment flare, hotter than fire and as destructive, but she could see in his face, in his hunched posture that he expected to be attacked, and her anger cooled enough for her to say, “You don’t need to know what happened to them?”

  Testhy dug his fingernail into the rough board of the table. Jeje’s straight black brows were quirked, furrowing her high brow—she looked hurt. She was probably the most popular of the entire band outside of Inda, yet she hadn’t the least idea of it. Testhy had thought a lot about the strange phenomenon of popularity because he wasn’t. People hardly noticed him; it had always been that way.

  He shook his head once. “I think I know,” he said to the table, so softly she almost couldn’t hear him.

  “But we don’t. And I have to find out.”

  “Why? What can you do if you do find out they are alive?”

  “I can try to—oh, I know it sounds stupid. Like some strut-rump trying to be a hero from a ballad, and maybe I’ll end up sunk, or dead, or laughed off the docks. But I know I have to find out. And do something. It’s because I know Inda would do it for me, if he’d been on the Vixen.”

  Testhy’s brows rose. Then he shook his head. “Maybe for you. You all were mates. Like you said.”

  “You were, too,” she retorted, and when she saw his lips twitch in denial, she said, “you could have been.” But as she said it she realized he couldn’t have, for whatever reason. She knew his likes and dislikes in food, because you can’t share a wardroom without discovering that, but where he went on liberty she had no idea. She’d never thought about it before—hadn’t been interested enough to ask.

  So she was trying to make him a mate now because she needed one, not because she wanted him as a mate. Regret, sharp and fierce, seized her. Everything had changed, and not because of the pirate attack. Things had changed inside her head.

  She said slowly, “Inda would go after you.”

  Testhy grimaced, then shunted one shoulder up under his ear, a sharp movement. “Maybe. But he’s better at fighting. If he lives, he might survive. I wouldn’t, not against pirates out at sea, not against the lawful authorities here. Your name isn’t on that list! Makes sense to find a new berth. Get on with my life.”

  “No, my name isn’t. I guess your way makes sense. But I don’t think it’s right.” As she spoke, she groped mentally toward a new discovery. “I have to find help. Fast, before those navy ships do anything. And if they won’t help because they think we’re pirates, then it’s to pirates I will go. Well, privateers.”

  Testhy sighed. “Privateers don’t run rescues.”

  “Sure they do. If there’s a reward.”

  Testhy stared at her, mouth turned down at the corners.

  Jeje’s face heated. “All right, so privateers might not help me. But just the same I’m going to sail back to Freedom Islands. Find someone there. Because I sure won’t here.”

  That’s it, she thought, that’s it. I’m not just following orders. For the first time it’s me who’s making the decisions.

  Testhy said, “You will never get the old life back.”

  Jeje clamped her teeth together. Is that what I’m doing after all?

  They sat there staring at one another, both realizing the conversation had shifted from “we” to “you” and “I.” Shared purpose had vanished like fog between the harbormaster’s office and here; they both knew that when they got up from that sticky old table they would part, probably forever. And both felt enough regret to keep talking.

  Testhy said, “We have good skills. We’re alive. Let’s stay that way. Move on.” But his sky-blue gaze was again on his calloused hands.

  “I have to know for sure. It’s right. Even if it’s not sensible.”

  Testhy shook his head, and would not look up.

  “Fare you well, then.” She got to her feet.

  She half expected him to follow, out of habit if nothing else, and she hoped he would, but his fear of pirates was too strong; he watched her go, and then comforted himself by thrusting a hand into his pocket to check the little stash of coins he’d always kept by him, ever since their first cruise. He left, walking away from the docks.

  While Nugget and the brothers sat aboard the Vixen, munching stale berry pastries that Nugget had bought from a dockside tavern before it closed, Jeje walked alone through the rain back to the dock. She was captain of her own life now; she was giving the orders. There was no pride. Or joy. Or triumph. She felt tired and heartsick and full of questions that had no answer.

  Chapter Three

  ON a sultry night two weeks later, far to the southeast of Choraed Elgaer, the Sierlaef—heir to the kingdom of Iasca Leror—downed more sweet wine, chilled in high mountain streams and brought down by Runners during the night. It was special wine, imported at great cost, but he drank it like water as he watched two young women dancing a slow, undulating
dance completely unlike the girls’ dances at home. Instead of the long robes he was used to, these girls wore tight blouses cut low, silky skirts that clung to the body, and sashes made of small bells around their hips that jingled and caught the eye in a way he liked very much. The Sierlaef saw the one with the biggest hips sending him speculative glances from heavy-lidded dark eyes, and he swallowed more wine, trying not to let anticipation heat up into urgency. There was still the after-dinner poetry to get through, and then meeting with that old bore Horseshoe Jaya-Vayir to plan the next day’s patrol of the eastern mountains.

  Noise from behind brought him to his feet, the wine cup crashing down to the table. The Jarl’s heir looked up, puzzled. The Sierlaef frowned toward the side entrance, from where a buzz of excitement spread through the room. Everyone crowded up, staring, turning and talking to those behind, until liegemen in crimson and gold came striding in.

  “Shit.”

  Did the Sierlaef really say that? The teenage heir exchanged a startled glance with his cousin, who would be his future Randael, or Shield Arm.

  Neither understood the royal heir, and truth to tell they didn’t much like him either. But he was here, seemed to want to stay, so they’d had to drop everything and entertain him for long, weary weeks of waiting for possible attack over the border.

  They watched in relief as the Sierlaef began shoving his way past servants bearing more wine and food, toward—

  The Harskialdna himself! The boys scrambled to their feet, the musicians paused, the dancers stopped. They could have been invisible now—everyone pushed toward the new arrivals, leaving them alone at the far end of the room. The dark-eyed one who had been hoping for a night with a prince—and the resulting favors—threw down her hand drum and marched off in disgust.

  The Sierlaef’s attention had shifted to the tall, dark-haired man who stood in the middle of a crowd of men, all deferential to him. His host, the Jarl of Jaya-Vayir, was finishing his formal greeting to the Sierlaef’s uncle, the Harskialdna, brother to the king.

  The Sierlaef pushed forward, and the men gave way. He practiced the words soundlessly first, making sure his stuttering tongue would not falter; when he reached his uncle he said, “My father sent you?”

  Anderle-Harskialdna grinned his wolf grin at everyone, and his voice was too loud, too jovial, as he said, “No, no, Aldren. No alarms, I only carry his greetings on my way to the border to inspect the supply lines.”

  His uncle—the man who had raised him—was the only person who called him Aldren. To everyone else he wasn’t even Aldren-Sierlaef, he was “the Sierlaef.”

  The Harskialdna still grinned as his words were whispered outward through the crowd, and they all visibly relaxed. Only the Sierlaef recognized the signs of his uncle’s anger. The old fear swooped through him, followed hard by anger. He’d had time to think, waiting here these long weeks. Think about how, all the years he was growing up, his uncle had never quite told the truth, only what he wanted believed.

  Surely the official Runners would be back by now, with word of Tanrid Algara-Vayir’s death. The problem was they inevitably stopped in the royal city first. If so, that meant his uncle knew. And here he was, instead of the Runners.

  The Sierlaef’s anger cooled into apprehension, then flared again. He knew his uncle would try to interfere with his plan to make his way northwest to Choraed Elgaer, and Tenthen Castle, to claim Joret Dei now that her betrothed, Tanrid Algara-Vayir, was dead. The brat Inda was long gone. There was no one left to marry her to.

  I am the future king. It is an honor for her to be chosen by me, the Sierlaef said inside his head, where there was never any stutter. Aldren-Harvaldar, war king. Maybe soon; his father near seventy!

  The Sierlaef was smiling by the time his uncle had gotten rid of the Jarl, his Randael, their liege men, and Runners of both houses, and they stood alone in the guest chamber set with the best furniture the family had to offer.

  “They’re reading your father’s letter about Tanrid Algara-Vayir right now, so you’d better get out your black sash for the bonfire. Your father ordered bonfires at every Jarl’s house, in honor of the death of a commander appointed directly by the king.” He watched the heir narrowly, and as he’d feared, the Sierlaef showed no surprise.

  “What have you done?” the Harskialdna whispered.

  “I?” the Sierlaef snapped, surly and defensive.

  “You know what I am talking about. I arrived in the royal city after the Runners from Idayago. Brigands killed Tanrid Algara-Vayir? Who’s going to believe that?”

  “In Idayagan dress.”

  The Harskialdna brought his fist down on a hand-carved wingback chair—moved for the first time in two generations to the guest chambers in honor of the royal heir. Not that he’d noticed. He’d grown up with such items all around him.

  “If your father orders an investigation, how many Idayagans will die before the truth comes out and he starts questioning your men? Who won’t be able to hide under kinthus that those brigands were in fact your hires?”

  Fear returned. “R-ruh-rr—”

  “Runners? My men opened all the messages sent to the royal city, but they were not alone in that. Did you forget Sindan? If he figures out something was suspicious, I can’t stop him from reporting to your father. And what then?”

  “But Unc—” Uncle Sindan the Sieralef almost said, though he hadn’t thought of his father’s lifelong mate as "uncle” for years. "S-Sindan away. At Olara. Made certain. ”

  “How could you possibly forget that he has Runners all over, spying on everyone, reporting to him and not to me? There is nothing whatsoever I can do about what he learns. You know he pretends to defer to me, but he reports straight to your father. Olara,” the Harskialdna finished in disgust. “Aldren, if you haven’t learned it, learn it now. He’s got eyes all over the kingdom, and they are loyal only to him.”

  And to Father, the Sierlaef thought. Not to you.

  The Harskialdna sighed, then rubbed his forehead. “I hope I never have to ride like that again. I did it to save you. As soon as I heard about the bugle call I knew your hand lay behind it. What possessed you to have them use an academy call?”

  Relief and triumph both flooded the Sierlaef. He crossed his arms, grinning. “Planned that. Horn by Tanrid.”

  “Yes, so they assumed. And grief seems, at least so far, to keep them from questioning why Tanrid, whose head was always cool, would be lost enough to blow the academy war game ride-to-shoot call.”

  “None of ’em know it. All dragoons. Riders. Either Sala or Trad Varadhe castles. No academy. Except your Runner.”

  “Your brother knows it.”

  “What?”

  “Your brother,” the Harskialdna’s eyes narrowed in fury, “was there. He was so very much there he arrived at the end of the attack, barely too late to save Tanrid.”

  “What? He-he—”

  “Was supposed to be building harbor walls, yes,” the Harskialdna said with savage sarcasm. “But he tangled with some local hustler, had a tiff, and dusted off to cry on Tanrid’s shoulder. A fellow, by the by. D’you think Tanrid—”

  The royal heir flung up a hand and cut him off. His brother’s and Tanrid’s sex lives were irrelevant; even in the extreme unlikelihood that Evred and Tanrid had discovered a sudden mutual passion, Tanrid was dead, and his passions no longer mattered to anyone. As for the Sierlaef’s brother Evred—not seen in years and whom his servants knew better than to mention—the Sierlaef still envisioned his younger brother as the clumsy, awkward poetry-spouter of six years ago. He knew his uncle’s penchant for worming out secrets, just from curiosity if not to use them to enforce obedience; this secret, if it even was one, was already worthless. “Evred said?”

  “He hasn’t said anything. That I know. He did write off to the Algara-Vayirs as well as your father, but I saw those messages. Evred’s letter was quite correct. The usual wine-sauce about Tanrid’s valor, plus he added some poetry in obsolete language
, probably as a sop to the women, very much in your brother’s usual style.” The Harskialdna shifted his attack. “So you intended your ‘brigands’ all to die?”

  The Sierlaef grinned. “Made sure. Expected reward.”

  “And your assassin? What’s to prevent him from talking, since he saw the reward his party got?”

  The Sierlaef laughed, though he endured the familiar twinge of regret at the necessity of killing his Runner Vedrid, who was fast and smart. However, there was a kingdom full of fast, smart fellows who wanted to be Runners to the future king.

  King.

  “Well?” the Harskialdna demanded, his harshness motivated by a wave of fear that he’d lost control, that he would be implicated, and what the king would do.

  The Sierlaef looked up, angry enough to get out what for him was a very long speech with a minimum of stutter. “Thought of that, too. He didn’t know the plan. Different orders. Any ‘brigands’ left alive, kill them. After, sent him to Buck Marlo-Vayir. Said meet me there. Sent message, kill him. Said he’d betrayed me.”

  “What?” His uncle’s voice cracked. “You brought in someone else?”

  The Sierlaef felt the words piling up, and his tongue and lips already started that hated flutter.

  He glared at his uncle. That glare, once considered sullen, had become frightening in its intensity, expressing so many years of frustration and rage.

  "Y-you. Wanted Buck. As n-next Harskialdna,” the Sierlaef whispered, because whispers sometimes damped the stutter. He had no idea how sinister it sounded.

  The Harskialdna flung out his hands. Anger, confusion, most of all a sense of lack of control—he hated that more than anything or anyone in a long list of hatreds—struck him silent.