Jade took a deep breath. “You’re right. We’ll do that now.”
They went back to the servants’ common room. Balm, Chime, and Stone were still in the bedchamber with Flower, but the others sat around on the floor and the couches. Everyone looked weary and sad. Rift was back against the far wall, separated from the others, still wary. Floret made an effort to perk up, and said, “What are we doing now?”
“We’re going to get off this damn leviathan.” Jade settled on one of the cushioned benches and pulled Moon down next to her. She told Song, “Go find the groundlings. Ask them to come here.”
Song hurried away, and a short time later they heard the groundlings in the corridor. Drift shifted to Raksura. River hissed at him before Jade or Moon could, and Drift immediately shifted back. He said, “Sorry, I was startled.” He actually sounded sorry. Moon suspected the good behavior was only going to last until the shock over Flower’s death faded.
Song came in, followed by Esom, Karsis, Negal, and Orlis, then one of the men who had been imprisoned in the tower. He was about Negal’s size, but his brown skin was more lined around the eyes, his hair more sprinkled with gray. Orlis smelled of nervous fear, and the new man looked as grim as if he was already resigned to some kind of betrayal. His expression tightened even more when he saw Rift.
Karsis stepped forward, cleared her throat, and said, “I believe you don’t know our leader, Negal, our second assistant deviser Orlis, and Captain Damison. This is Jade, sister queen of the Indigo Cloud Court, and her consort Moon.”
Moon caught Song giving Karsis a slight nod of approval. Taking her diplomatic duties as a female warrior seriously, she must have quickly informed Karsis of the proper way to greet Jade.
Negal inclined his head politely. “I’m sorry to have to make your acquaintance under such unpleasant circumstances. And I wish to apologize to you for our part in the theft of your property. Our assistance to Magister Ardan was involuntary, but I know it has put your court in a dangerous position.”
It was the right thing to say. Moon could feel Jade’s tension uncoiling. She said, “I’m willing to believe that. Karsis and Esom have said that you want an alliance with us, that together we can use your flying ship to escape this place. Do they speak for you?”
Negal glanced at Esom and Karsis, and smiled slightly. “In this case, yes.” Song pushed a couple of stools forward and indicated that the groundlings should sit down. Negal and the others moved to take seats, but Captain Damison said, “What about him? Rift.”
Behind them, Rift stirred, started to stand. Moon turned his head enough to pin him with a look. Rift froze, and sunk back to the floor. Jade didn’t even bother to flick a spine in Rift’s direction. Her eyes on Damison, she said, “He isn’t your concern.”
“That problem appears to be sorted,” Esom said to Damison. He pushed a stool at him and said pointedly, “Now sit down.”
Damison hesitated, still watching Rift with deadly intensity. Then Stone came out of the back room. He stopped, glanced over the groundlings noncommittally, then came around to sit on the floor near Jade’s feet. He said, in Raksuran, “Chime is taking it hard.”
Moon started to get up. Jade caught his arm and gently stopped him. “Balm is with him.”
Moon settled back, reluctantly. Esom looked from Stone to Jade. “Is Chime all right?” he asked, concern evident in his voice. Chime’s name would have been the only word he could understand in the Raksuran exchange.
Karsis added, “If he’s injured, perhaps I could help?”
Jade shook her head. “He was close to Flower; she taught him, when he was a mentor.”
“Oh, I see. Of course,” Esom said, though it was clear he didn’t really understand, except that Chime had been Flower’s student. Esom sat back, but the moment seemed to ease the tension. Damison glanced around uncomfortably, then finally took a seat.
Negal leaned forward and clasped his hands on his knee. “As you proposed, the best way to escape this city is on our ship, the Klodifore. If we cooperate, we should be able to reach the harbor and secure it. As long as the city authorities don’t realize that we’re working together, they shouldn’t suspect that retrieving the ship is our goal.” He spread his hands. “Then we can take you east, all the way to the forest coast if need be, before we head back to our own home.”
Jade asked, “Can you launch the ship while the leviathan is still moving?”
Esom exchanged a look with Orlis. “It won’t be easy, but I’m certainly willing to try.”
“If I never see this creature again it will be too soon,” Orlis agreed. “I’ll risk anything to get off it.”
Then Root ducked into the doorway, so abruptly the groundlings flinched. He said, “A groundling banged on the outside door and said Magister Lethen wants to talk!”
Jade frowned and asked Moon, “Do you know who that is?”
“Yes.” He pushed himself upright. “He was outside the mortuary with the other magisters. I don’t think he and Ardan were friends.”
“They weren’t,” Negal said, frowning. “They were bitter rivals.”
Jade tapped her claws on the couch cushion, thinking. “How strong is his magic?”
“He certainly couldn’t seem to do anything about Ardan,” Negal told her. “I think he would have if he could.” He hesitated. “Will you speak to him?”
Jade nodded reluctantly. “We’d better. Just to stall him, if nothing else.” She told Negal, “You come to the hall and listen, but don’t let him see you.”
Out in the exhibit hall, Jade had Negal stand just out of sight to one side of the entrance passage, so he could listen to the conversation. Stone stood just out of sight to the other side, in case it wasn’t a conversation that Lethen had in mind. Vine, Floret, River, and Drift were also clinging to the wall above the passage. The others, with Negal’s crew, were poised to retreat into the underground if they had to.
Jade put her hand on the door bar and said, “Ready?”
“Probably,” Moon told her. If Lethen had magic like Ardan’s, all their preparations meant nothing. But if Lethen had magic like Ardan’s, Moon was betting he wouldn’t have had to use the firepowder to get into the mortuary.
Jade lifted the bar and pulled the door open.
Lethen stood just outside. He was as Moon remembered him from the evening in the tower: a richly-dressed, ruinously old blue-pearl man. His gaze went to Jade first. He stared at her with guarded curiosity. Then he looked at Moon and frowned, startled. “You. The trader.” His expression turned saturnine. “You’re one of them. Did Ardan know?”
There was no reason not to admit it now. “Yes.”
Lethen swore. “The fool.”
Jade said sharply, “He attacked us. He came to our colony while we were gone and stole from us.”
“I’m not disputing that.” Lethen folded his gnarled hands over the head of his cane. “He claimed to need artifacts of arcane power to keep the leviathan from sinking. Since we’re all still alive, I assume that wasn’t true.”
Moon didn’t see any reason not to admit that, too. “No. All he needed was the bridle.”
“Then I’m a fool as well, for I believed him.” Lethen eyed them a moment. “Do you know where this creature is taking us?”
“No.”
Lethen said, “I do. We’re headed northeast, toward Emriat-terrene.”
Jade flicked a look at Moon. He said, “It’s going home.” That was the place in the story Rith had told them, the home of the sorcerers who had originally built the city atop the leviathan.
“A logical assumption,” Lethen admitted. “It’s returning to its original position.” He added, “I’m a very old man. Unlike Ardan, I have all the wealth and temporal power I’m likely to ever need, and I have no wish to live on something that moves, either at someone’s direction or its own random whim.”
Moon said, “You want the bridle.”
Lethen inclined his head. “T
he question is, what do you want?”
Moon exchanged a look with Jade. She said, “We want the flying boat.”
Lethen frowned. “The what?”
“The metal ship in the harbor, the one that Ardan stole from the foreign explorers.” Jade hesitated. “It’s still there, isn’t it?”
“I believe so. The harbormaster was charged with lifting it out of the water with the fishing fleet. I assume he still did his job.” Lethen regarded her with open skepticism. “That’s all you want?”
“Yes,” Moon told him. “We’ll give you the bridle, if you let us leave, with the explorers, on that boat.”
Jade said, “That’s not all. In Ardan’s collection, there’s a wooden container, an urn—”
Lethen waved that away. “My dear, take anything from this tower that you want. You can strip the place down to the foundations if you like. I’ve spoken with Ardan’s wife. She makes no claim on his property.” His sharp gaze switched back to Moon. “She told me that you allowed her to leave with her children and personal servants. It was the reason I thought it might be possible to negotiate with you.”
“We don’t kill unless we’re provoked,” Jade said. It wasn’t quite a threat.
Lethen’s expression was sardonic. “I’ll keep that in mind. I don’t supposed you’d like to give me the bridle now.”
Hardly, Moon thought. “At the harbor, by the boat.”
“I’ll be waiting.” He gave them an ironic nod and turned away. They watched him hobble briskly across the square.
As they closed the door behind him, Jade said, “Do you think we can trust him?”
“No. But I think he wants the bridle, and he doesn’t care about us.”
Negal stepped into the passage. “I agree. And I think we should leave, now, before he changes his mind.”
Nobody wanted to argue with that.
Chapter Eighteen
Moon stepped into the room where Flower had died. The vaporlights were dimming, issuing only a little glowing mist, and the room was thick with shadows. Her body still lay on the bed, wrapped in silky sheets. It made an absurdly small bundle. He made himself look away, to the corner where Balm and Chime sat.
Chime huddled half in Balm’s lap, and she stroked his hair. Moon went to kneel beside them and put a hand on Chime’s back. “We have to leave. We’re going to the flying ship in the harbor.”
Balm lifted her brows. “Now? Isn’t it still daylight?”
“We have a deal with the magister who’s taking Ardan’s place.” At her expression, he added, “I know, but we’re hoping this one works out better.”
Chime took a sharp breath and sat up. He looked sick, exhausted. “What about her body? Do we have to leave her here? We should hide her, so they don’t—”
“No, we’re going to take her.” Jade had decided to take the queen’s funerary urn from Ardan’s collection for the purpose. It was big enough to hold a small Arbora body, once the current occupant was removed. Moon was going to let Stone handle that part.
“Oh.” Chime nodded, swallowed, and made to get up.
The groundlings hadn’t had many personal possessions with them, just clothing and a few things Ardan had allowed them to bring from their ship. They went up to quickly gather what they needed, and the Raksura spent the time raiding the tower’s kitchens and food stores, taking everything that could be easily transported and stuffed into bags. “There’s no meat,” Drift complained at one point as he turned out the contents of a cabinet.
“You’ll eat bread and dried fish and like it,” Balm told him, in the tone of someone on her last nerve.
Once that was done, both groups assembled in the exhibit hall, in the passage to the outer door. Moon had wondered if Negal’s people would take the opportunity to loot Ardan’s belongings, as compensation for their imprisonment. It didn’t look like they had; the packs they carried were all stuffed with bags from the tower’s dry food stores. Maybe they didn’t want any reminders, or maybe their isolated land valued different things. All Negal had was a shoulder bag stuffed with paper, perhaps writing done while he was trapped here.
“You haven’t changed your mind?” Jade asked Negal. She had the seed, carefully wrapped in Flower’s old pack, securely fastened between her wing join and her shoulder. Vine, the largest male warrior, had shouldered the big pack that contained the urn. It was a heavy burden, more than four paces tall and two wide, but Stone was going to be too occupied to carry it.
Negal glanced back at the others. All of them except Karsis and Esom watched the Raksura with suspicion. They kept looking at Rift and then looking away. Negal had said they wouldn’t want to be carried through the air, an attitude that Moon could understand given their experiences with Rift. But that wasn’t going to make getting to the port any safer. “Unfortunately not,” Negal said, a little wryly. “Though we are certain it would be a unique experience.”
“I hope your walk to the harbor doesn’t turn out to be a unique experience,” Jade said, and nodded for Stone to go ahead.
Stone pushed open the doors and stepped out into the daylight. He shifted and his dark form blocked the doorway for a heartbeat. There was a chorus of gasps and startled flinches from the groundlings who hadn’t seen him before. Then he sprang into the air so fast he seemed to vanish.
Moon followed Jade to the doorway, the warriors behind them. The plaza looked empty from here, but Stone circled overhead to scan for ambushes or hidden traps. He tipped a wing to show it was clear.
Turning back to Negal, Jade said, “Follow us. We’ll make certain your route is safe.”
Negal gripped his bag and said, “We will.”
Jade stepped out and leapt into flight; Moon and the warriors followed her. As soon as they were above the surrounding buildings, the wind hit them like a hammer. The warriors dropped back low over the rooftops, but Moon fought it, tried to ride it without being slammed into anything, until he caught Jade’s signal. Then he angled off and made for the harbor.
Jade and the others would stay with the groundlings, following them roof to roof to make sure they weren’t attacked on the way through the city. They had decided that Moon and Stone would fly ahead to the ship to see if there were guards or magisters lurking aboard.
Buffeted by the wind, Moon saw mostly empty streets below, with only a few moving figures. He had to circle around to hit the harbor, but saw it was almost deserted too, the big slips for the trading vessels empty, the small fishing boats swinging in their raised cradles. The Klodifore was still there, tied to its pier, suspended several paces above the water. The leviathan’s motion was causing the water in the harbor to churn, kicking up huge fountains of spray along the piers.
Stone circled overhead, and as Moon dropped down for a landing on the roof of the ship’s top steering cabin, he turned and dipped down toward the water, abruptly vanishing behind the fishing fleet’s cradles. I hope he knows what he’s doing, Moon thought.
He crouched on the edge of the cabin roof, the wind tearing at his frills. A door on the lowest deck opened and three groundlings hurriedly exited to climb carefully down the narrow ramp that connected the ship to the pier. Those must be Ardan’s men, the ones who had been taught to make the ship lift itself out of the water when the leviathan moved. Moon glanced across to the docks. A small group of groundlings waited in the shelter of one of the rickety buildings, as far away from the churning water as possible. One was Magister Lethen.
So far so good. Moon climbed down to the deck just below, found a door, and stepped inside.
To be out of the wet wind was a relief. He flicked his spines, shaking off the spray, and tasted the air. He caught a scent of nervous groundling, but it was fading fast, probably from the men who had just left.
Still, he searched the ship quickly, looking into every room and cubby, but found no one hiding aboard. He came back out onto the main deck in time to see Jade and the warriors above the harbor, about to make the difficult aerial approach to the bo
at. Negal, Karsis, Esom, and the other groundlings were just coming down the steps onto the dock.
Lethen and his men moved out from the shelter to meet them. Moon jumped down to the pier. From this angle he could see the bottom of the Klodifore, its hull hovering a few paces above the swirling water. Waves rushed continuously over the pier and made the walk along it wet and dangerous. Moon reached the dock just as Negal and the others reached Lethen.
“You have it?” Lethen demanded, raising his voice to a bellow to be heard over the wind and water. The men with him weren’t all armed guards, and they weren’t all blue-pearls; a few members of the other two dominant groundling races were present, the golden-skinned and darkskinned people. Some were dressed richly enough to be other magisters or prominent traders. A few wore working clothes.
Negal looked at Moon, who shifted to groundling, to startled exclamations from Lethen’s companions. He took the bridle out of his pack and said, “Let them go to the ship, and I’ll give it to you.”
Lethen glared, frowned suspiciously at the bridle, then said, “Very well.”
Negal threw Moon a guarded look and led his people past. This was their most vulnerable moment, but somehow Moon didn’t think even a magister would have brought this diverse group out to see him betray the Raksura.
Moon waited until the groundlings had made the uneasy trek down the pier and were crossing the little walkway up to the ship. Jade and the warriors had already landed on the upper deck and were watching intently. Then he handed the bridle to Lethen.
The Magister turned it over, examined it carefully, rubbed at the crystals with his thumb. Then he grunted, and asked Moon, “Will you need assistance casting off?”
In other words, go away and don’t come back. That suited Moon. He said, “No, thank you.”
He turned his back on them and went to the edge of the dock, then shifted and reached the Klodifore’s lower deck in two long bounds.
The groundlings were all aboard, gathered on the deck. “Thank you,” Negal said to Moon. His voice shook a little, though he kept his expression calm. He looked back at the city, the towers rising on the leviathan’s flanks. “I never thought we would leave this place.”