Beyond the Pool of Stars Read online

  The two women were doing quite a lot of talking. Ivrian rather wished he felt well enough to listen in. He tried to rise, but grew dizzy and sat back down.

  He watched Tokello walk among the crew. Two of the Daughter’s sailors were apparently done for, but a fellow in a striped shirt who’d been holding his chest was now talking with a mate as he was helped belowdecks.

  Tokello tended five others for minor wounds before coming finally to Rendak. He turned the bridge over to Gombe and faced Tokello, offering his wounded arm.

  Mirian and Ivrian’s mother, still in conversation, stepped into the cabin at the back of the quarterdeck. Ivrian stood up to follow, but then Tokello cut the arrowhead with her huge knife and pulled the shaft out of Rendak’s arm by the black fletching.

  That final spurt of blood from Rendak’s wound was the push that brought Ivrian to the rail’s edge, where he vomited lunch and breakfast out onto the churning waves.

  3

  Percentages and Proofs

  Mirian

  Mirian frowned as she took in the shambles the pirates had left of the narrow captain’s cabin. Fading light from the slim galley windows spilled over broken desk drawers and torn papers and charts scattered across the deck. The mattress from the bunk under the windows had been slashed apart, probably in a search for hidden valuables.

  At least the little dining table was intact, although one of its chairs lay with a smashed back—the one at the head of the table, where her father would have sat. Fitting.

  One of the few unsullied items was the wood carving Mirian laid carefully on the table. She’d found it tossed aside on the deck above, dropped in the mad scramble before the bloodshed. Her mother’s work, in brown and blond woods, showing Leovan smiling, with Mirian herself grinning up at him. How old had she been? Nine? Eleven? Her fingers trembled as she returned the carving to the nail that had secured it to the bulkhead, but the bracket on the carving’s back was warped, and it wouldn’t hang straight. She thought she might be able to fix that, at least. Her eyes dropped to her fingers, trying to decide if they shook with anger or sorrow.

  She heard the light step of Lady Galanor behind her and the click of the cabin door as the noblewoman shut it.

  “Please, sit, m’lady.” Mirian forced calm into her voice. “I apologize for the décor.”

  “I’m sorry for it as well,” the woman replied as she righted a chair to settle on.

  Mirian rooted among the shirts lying beside a chest that had been hacked open. Rendak’s clothes, not her father’s. With a muttered apology she turned to remove her wet undergarment and slipped the shirt on in its place. Rendak’s arms were longer than hers, so she rolled the sleeves up to the elbow.

  Mirian picked up the broken chair, then took the seat across from Lady Galanor. She rubbed at a spot on her pants she suspected was blood.

  Lady Galanor wistfully contemplated the crooked carving. Here, in the dim light from the galley windows, she seemed younger.

  Like many Sargavan nobles, Lady Galanor was olive-skinned, with a proud hawk’s beak of a nose. Her shoulders were high with assurance. Yet she lacked some of the arrogance of manner so common to aristocrats, and judging from her skillful swordplay, she was no layabout. Mirian gave up trying to guess her age. Was she prematurely silver, or simply an older woman who’d stayed in shape?

  Lady Galanor smiled apologetically. “Thank you, again, Miss Raas.”

  “Thank Desna,” Mirian demurred. “I happened along at the right time.”

  “I shall praise her for your timing, and you for everything else.” A glance back at the carving. “There was a spark in you when you were a child. I see it has flared into something grand.”

  Mirian looked more closely at the woman, but couldn’t recall seeing her before. “You knew me as a child?”

  Lady Galanor smiled wistfully. “Your father and I were close friends once. I helped him found the Sargavan Adventurer’s Club.”

  “The club?” She eyed the woman across from her even more carefully. Father and a small band of like-minded Sargavans had purchased a building where they could celebrate their exploits, trade information, and, naturally, drink. The club’s failure had been a bitter memory for him.

  “It was a fine notion,” Lady Galanor said. “But like many fine notions in Sargava, it was crushed under the weight of tradition.”

  Mirian considered Lady Galanor’s face and tried to subtract the years. She was still striking now; what would she have looked like twenty or thirty years ago? Was she looking at one of her father’s former lovers? “Father never mentioned you.”

  Lady Galanor’s smile turned sad. “I’m employed by the baron, the Noble Custodian of Sargava. I’ve had to be away for long periods. Your father and I hadn’t seen much of each other for a long time.”

  And how much of each other did you see before that? Mirian had decided to humor Lady Galanor’s request for a private chat, but there were things that needed doing, the least of which was fixing this cabin. She wanted to look in on Rendak, find out why the Daughter was here, and learn why her brother wasn’t aboard. It was time to speed things along. “You said you wanted to talk to me about something important.”

  The aristocrat reached into a pocket and produced the rumpled letters she’d taken off the pirate’s leader. “The captain was commanded by that Chelish man.”

  So she’d said outside. Why couldn’t they discuss this on the deck? Mirian nodded.

  Lady Galanor touched the paper. “Someone without a signature specifically ordered him to target your ship. And me.”

  “It’s not my ship,” Mirian said. “But go on. Why were they after you?”

  Lady Galanor folded her hands and cleared her throat. “I’m raising funds for the yearly tithe. And the Chelaxians want to stop that, naturally. Before he died, your father was setting up a salvaging expedition into the interior he thought would be particularly helpful to our cause. Did he mention anything about it to you?”

  Mirian shook off a shiver. She wasn’t getting any warmer as the sun went down. “I haven’t heard from my father since I left home six years ago. My mother wrote once a month, but the messages didn’t always reach me right away. I only learned of his death last week.”

  “I see. I’m sorry for your loss, then.”

  “We were no longer close.” Mirian’s fingers found a loose thread in Rendak’s shirt to pull. She thought of the man her father used to be. “Lady Galanor, my father was perhaps the least prejudiced colonial ever born, with one exception—he despised Sargavan nobles. Passionately. If you let him, he could rant about them for hours. It’s not that I doubt your story, it’s—”

  “Of course he hated them. It was Lady Daugustana who drove the wedge between Leo and his first wife.” Lady Galanor tapped the table near the carving for emphasis. “And it was Lady Daugustana and her cronies who destroyed the club. We wanted to move Sargava forward, and the old always want to keep it the same.” She laughed. “Now I’m the old.”

  “Not as old as Daugustana.”

  “Hah. No, not nearly. Mirian—may I call you Mirian? I did, once, when you were very young.”

  “You may,” Mirian said cautiously. “Pardon me, m’lady. I wouldn’t mind a little light, would you?”

  “You may call me Alderra. And yes, that would be appreciated.”

  Both lanterns hung above the table had somehow escaped the wrath of the pirates. After rooting around through one of the cracked drawers lying on the deck, Mirian located flint, steel, and a length of slow-burn cable. In a moment her practiced hands had lit the lanterns, obligingly opened by Alderra.

  Once flames were flickering in the glass, Mirian blew out the cable and returned it to the drawer. As she bent to set the drawer into the desk beside the door she caught sight of a familiar panel in the bulkhead at knee level.

  Why not? She pressed her palm to the wood. Concealed behind the ordinary plank was a narrow cubby where her father usually kept a bottle of wine. There was stil
l a bottle there, although as she lifted it to the light, she found it a dark amber rather than the red she expected.

  Leovan Raas’s tastes had apparently changed over the years. Or Rendak had found the wine cache and replaced it with something he liked better.

  “A drink, Alderra?” Mirian said. “I can’t vouch for the vintage, and I’m not sure I have any glasses. I believe its whiskey.”

  “After that scrape, I can’t say I’m picky.”

  Mirian uncorked the bottle, sniffed, and passed it to her.

  Alderra took a swig and seemed satisfied. “Heady stuff.” She handed it back.

  The aristocrat was right. The whiskey opened with a kick and closed with a smooth fade. Mirian held it up to the lantern light but couldn’t make out the writing on the label.

  Lady Galanor cleared her throat. “Here’s my problem, Miss Raas. Your father died as he was finishing up a dive on an unrelated venture. I allowed some weeks to pass before I pursued the matter with your brother, and that is perhaps where I erred.” She smiled glumly. “I did not wish to push business matters during a mourning period.”

  Lady Galanor seemed to want some sort of response. “Understandable,” Mirian said.

  “By the time I asked your brother about the expedition your father planned, he told me he had dismissed the other parties involved.”

  “Other parties?” Mirian was still thinking about her father’s death. Her mother’s account had been vague.

  “Lizardfolk. Kellic said he found them ‘unseemly.’”

  “Unseemly,” Mirian repeated. That didn’t sound like the Kellic she knew, a boy who’d followed Father like a puppy, imitating his every gesture.

  “I’ve decided to hire you to find the lizardfolk that your father planned to work with. And then lead the salvage team.”

  Mirian plunked the bottle down unintentionally hard—a ringing thunk filled the little cabin. “Alderra, I didn’t come back to run the business. I returned to comfort my mother and throw some flowers on my father’s grave. I intend to depart Eleder and its embalmed grandeur at the earliest opportunity.”

  Alderra Galanor contemplated her before gesturing for the bottle and pulling another swig. “There are good people in Eleder. They need your help.”

  “I’m a Pathfinder now, m’lady. Alderra,” she corrected herself. “I left my team at a dig site north of Freehold. They need me there.”

  “Do they? What if Eleder needs you more?”

  “Eleder needs a half-native salvager? Tell me another.”

  Alderra smiled thinly. “The baron knows Sargava needs to move forward. He’s hampered by crones like Daugustana and all the petty councilors. He has to fight for every tiny concession. Extending that road down through the city outskirts—”

  “The slums?”

  “If you like.”

  “They’re slums.”

  “The baron extended the main road through the slums last year so the laborers wouldn’t be calf-deep in mud during rainy season. To get enough votes to put it through the house, he had to promise a tax break to the nobles for the next three years. And that’s put him in a bind, because there’s one large payment that has to be made every year unless we want a Chelish fleet at our quays.”

  “To the Free Captains.”

  “Yes. Daugustana and her ilk won’t find their money much use if Cheliax sails back in and reclaims our country, but they’re blind to the threat. They’re obsessed with their little games, conveniently forgetting that without the pirate fleet protecting our waters, they’d all be kicking from a gibbet, or screaming on the tines.”

  “Eleder’s petty politics, Lady Galanor, are just part of the reason I left.”

  “So I gather.” Alderra paused but didn’t follow up that line of thought. “I must find a revenue source so we can pay our tithe to the Free Captains of the Shackles. Your brother has been wasting my time poking around the deeps for a wreck ever since your father died, and produced nothing. I cannot continue working with your family unless you take over.”

  “That’s unfortunate,” Mirian said. “But I’m not interested.”

  Alderra’s eyebrows lowered. “If you find me the lizardfolk and set up the salvage run, I’ll cut the Raas family in for twenty percent of the profit.”

  Mirian blinked away her astonishment. “Let me get this straight: You mean to induce me by taking eighty percent? While I find the salvage drop, furnish the ship and the experts, and run the risk? Why should I give you any percent at all?”

  Alderra cleared her throat. “It’s possible that you’re not aware of certain circumstances.” She watched Mirian for a reaction.

  “What circumstances?”

  “This is awkward.” Alderra took a deep breath, observing Mirian, as though she expected her to interrupt at any moment. “Your family is heavily in debt. There’s little room left to meet those obligations apart from selling off your ship or your home. Perhaps both will be needed.”

  Mirian stared, seeking meaning in words that made no sense. She searched the older woman’s face for some sign that this was a joke. One in terrible taste. Could Alderra be telling the truth? Where would her family live without the house? Mother and Kellic would be devastated, to say nothing of the men and women who worked for them both in the home and on the ship. How would they make a living?

  Alderra’s expression softened. “I’m sorry. I see now that you had no idea.”

  “No,” Mirian managed, finally. She felt flushed. It’d been a long while since she’d downed such potent whiskey. She was surprised by how calm she sounded. “Is this your doing? Is that how you maneuvered my father into working for you?”

  “What? No! I had nothing to do with your father’s choices, my dear. I gather he’s had a hard time of it for the last few years. I needed his help, and I thought he could use mine.”

  Mirian felt that flush fading. Lady Galanor could be lying, but it was more likely her father had run into some bad luck. Salvaging had its lean years. And it would be just like Mother not to send word of anything upsetting. It was a wonder she’d even written to inform her about her father’s death. “How did he get into so much debt?”

  “He sank a great deal of money into a new ship, and there was a dockyard fire when it was two-thirds built. Apparently he promised more than he actually had to spend.”

  Father had occasionally dreamed about a larger ship, but Mirian had never thought he’d actually want to part with the Daughter.

  Alderra misread her silence as skepticism. “I’m not trying to threaten you, Mirian. That twenty percent should be enough to pay off the debts and leave you with a little profit as well.”

  Mirian set the bottle back down and found herself asking: “Twenty percent of how much?”

  “Did you ever play cards with your father? He kept things very close to his chest. All I know is that he promised a fortune in gems. Enough to drown the crone.”

  The crone being Lady Daugustana. Mirian felt a smile pull at the corner of her mouth. “Now that sounds like my father. But he was prone to exaggerate.”

  “When he told a tale, yes. But not when he gave his word. Leo shook hands on it with me, Mirian. I believed him. And I believe in you. You can find the necessary partners and lead the salvage team.”

  It was strange to hear this woman calling Father by his first name, and in such a comfortable way. Again she wondered just how close Alderra and her father had once been.

  Mirian ran her eyes along the carved image of her father’s face tilting heavenward on the wall. “I’m not as skilled at salvaging. Not like he was at his prime.”

  “Perhaps not. But he wasn’t in his prime when we shook on it.”

  That was surely true. Long years had passed since her father was that smiling, bronzed man who could shrug off whatever the world threw his way. In the years before Mirian left, the bitterness had worn him down, and more and more often those powerful shoulders had been fortified by a constant influx of alcohol.

 
She thought about the trio of Pathfinders waiting for her in Freehold. Tyrin was seasoned enough to manage things until she got back. She frowned, remembering that mosaic they’d found the day before she left. She’d dearly wanted to make a good sketch of it, but Tyrin could probably handle that duty as well. She’d have to write him with instructions.

  For now, it looked as though she would be stuck here. “All right, then.”

  “There’s one more thing you need to know: the Chelish may have played a part in your father’s death.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I don’t. Not for sure. But they certainly appear to have tried to arrange mine. I suspect that either someone close to the baron is a Chelish spy, or…” she let her voice trail off. “I’m afraid I shall have to be indelicate. Your brother has taken up with a Chelish woman.”

  Mirian’s voice cracked like a whip. “You’re implying my brother was involved in my father’s death?”

  “I didn’t say that. Spies can be very clever. They can sew information together from little threads. If she is a spy, and Kellic happened to mention where your father was diving, it would be all she needed to act. Without him, the arrangement fell through, which is awfully convenient for Chelish interests, don’t you think?”

  Mirian fingered the neck of the bottle and let out a low sigh. She dearly wanted another drink, but decided against it. She was near her limit.

  “I know it’s a lot to take in all at once. And, in all fairness, your brother’s paramour may be completely innocent.”

  “Suppose,” Mirian said, “my brother’s the only one who knows where to find the lizardfolk? If I have to talk to him about it, he might talk to this woman.”

  “You’ll have to ask him not to do that.”

  She hadn’t seen Kellic in years. She didn’t relish the idea of casually working “your lover might be a Chelish spy” into the conversation.