Isles of the Forsaken (30 page)

“I know that.”

“You have one in particular that I am authorized to offer a ransom for.”

“What sort of ransom?” Harg didn’t need to ask which prisoner; he could guess that.

Jobin named a handsome sum in money, but Harg was unimpressed, and showed it. “I have a limited range in which to negotiate,” Jobin warned him.

“What makes you think we want money for him?” Harg said.

Taken aback, Jobin said, “What
do
you want?” Then, apprehensively, “Arms? That’s a bigger risk for us.”

“We have some demands,” Harg said.

After a momentary pause, Jobin said, “The Innings won’t negotiate political demands.”

“I’m not talking to an Inning. Or am I?” He frowned at Jobin’s studiously blank look. “You know, I believe you, that you’re not a Tiarch’s-man.”

“It’s true,” said Jobin.

“Because I think you’re Native Navy. You’re working for Admiral Talley, aren’t you?”

Jobin looked like he was poised to leap, but couldn’t decide which direction. He was watching Harg’s face for some clue. At last he looked down. “You’re right, in a way,” he said. “I
was
in the navy. I resigned a few weeks ago, and went to work for Mr. Sorrell.”

“Why did you resign?” Harg asked.

Jobin’s face flushed; it was obviously a sore point. Reluctantly, he said, “I was . . . encouraged to. Otherwise, I’d be demoted for something that wasn’t my fault. The Tornabay command is in total turmoil. Everyone knows the occupation’s being mishandled, and it’s not always the right heads rolling for it.”

“Is Talley there yet?”

“Yes,” Jobin said with a mix of fear and resentment that rang true.

“The Southern Squadron?”

“Not all of it, yet. Only three ships.”

“Who’s in charge of it?”

“An Inning, Commodore Tenniel.”

“I thought the admiral was going to nativize the officer corps.”

“It was all just talk,” Jobin said bitterly. “There was a Torna named Joffrey in charge of the Northern Squadron for a little while. Now he’s out, and the admiral’s in charge himself.”

“I was wondering why they hadn’t moved.”

“Complete organizational breakdown, that’s why,” Jobin said.

“Some things never change,” Harg said with a grim smile. “What do they know about us?”

“I wasn’t in a position to know,” Jobin said. “All I know is, the admiral’s hot as a firesnake. He’s taking it personally, they say.”

Harg pondered this. He couldn’t imagine Admiral Talley being less than professional. Perhaps his brother’s captivity made things different. “Do you know the admiral?” he asked.

“No,” Jobin said. “Don’t you?”

Harg shook his head.

Jobin was watching him curiously. When their eyes met, Jobin said, “You
were
in the navy?”

“That doesn’t mean I hobnobbed with the admiral,” Harg said drily. “He didn’t exactly invite us round for tea. I met him once, the day I resigned.”

“Lucky you,” Jobin said.

Harg wasn’t yet sure whether Jobin was what he said. One thing he strongly suspected, though: if he spoke to Jobin, there would be ears listening on the other end, perhaps important ones. He had to take the risk—very, very cautiously.

“You said Mr. Sorrell was willing to act as go-between,” he said.

“What do you have in mind?” Jobin said carefully.

“A peaceful resolution,” Harg said, “if the Innings want it. But they’ll have to listen to us.”

The fact that Jobin didn’t answer at once increased Harg’s impression that the man was more than just a messenger. Messengers didn’t have to think about their answers.

“There are people in Tornabay willing to listen to you,” Jobin said at last, slowly. “War’s not good for everyone’s business.”

“We want to send a delegation with a list of demands.”

“What sort of demands?”

Harg didn’t want to admit that they were still wrangling over the demands. He wanted Jobin to think they were firm and united. So he said, “We want to be an independent territory under the Empire, with full political rights. That means our own civilian governor, with power equal to Tiarch’s. We want independent courts with Adaina judges. We want to be policed by our own squadron of the Native Navy, with Adaina officers. We want a promise of full citizenship rights. And we don’t want to pay tariffs on our goods.”

Jobin looked thoroughly taken aback. Harg said, “Why, what did you expect us to want—permission to go naked and pound drums?”

“They’re ambitious demands,” Jobin said at last.

“We’re ambitious people.”

“I can see that.” He was obviously still trying to reconfigure his expectations. “And what about you? Where do you fit in this independent territory?”

The question was typical of the mindset of Tornabay, where corruption was the scaffolding on which everything was erected. Harg’s first reaction was disgust at the implication that he was doing this for personal gain. But he caught himself before expressing it, because he was curious to know what Jobin would offer. “That’s not up to me,” he said.

“Who is it up to?” When Harg didn’t answer at once, Jobin said, “The Heir of Gilgen?”

It was the closest anyone had come to asking point blank what his ambitions were. Scowling at Jobin, Harg said, “Did I say the word ‘Ison’?”

“No, you said ‘governor.’ I was wondering if it was a euphemism.”

The fact was, no one outside this room was saying “governor.” They were all saying “Ison.” It really
wasn’t
up to Harg. That was his dilemma. What he wanted and what the Adaina wanted were not always the same.

“You know that Tiarch has the Heir of Gilgen?” Jobin said.

“We’d heard that,” Harg said.

“You may not know that the Innings are going to take over custody of him. There has been talk of quietly getting rid of him for good.”

Harg shook his head. “They’d be idiots to do that. There would be no surer way of making the Outer Chains explode into rebellion.”

“From the Inning point of view, it would be eliminating one festering source of coalition.”

Harg wasn’t sure where Jobin was going with this, but he wasn’t following.

“You’re not concerned? Even as a fellow Yoran?” Jobin said.

“What do you mean?”

“Yora’s not that big. You surely knew him.”

“Knew who?”

“The Heir of Gilgen. Goran, son of Listor. He called himself Goth Batra, I think.”

Harg felt like a shell had just detonated in his face. For a moment he was blinded, staring at Jobin without seeing him. “
Goth
is the Heir of Gilgen?” he said. His voice sounded distant, someone else’s.

“You didn’t know?” Jobin looked surprised in turn.

Goth was a prisoner of Tiarch. It was Goth’s life that was a variable in the cruel political calculus of the Inning occupation. It was not the Heir of Gilgen, it was the person Harg cared for more than any human being alive.

Jobin had already seen how staggered he was by the news. Instinctively, Harg knew he had to get out before he gave anything else away, as he was sure to do. Without another word, he went to the door and left the room. Out in the hall, a Torna clerk who had been doing paperwork for him was passing by, but paused, arrested by Harg’s expression.

“Go get someone to take charge of the man in this room,” Harg said. “He’s a spy, a dangerous one. I don’t want him talking with anyone. Understand?”

“Yes, Captain,” the clerk said.

Harg left the customs house by the back door. He didn’t want anyone to see him or ask questions. The whole world had rearranged around him. He had to talk to someone from Yora.

He headed uphill fast, toward the dhotamar’s house. When he knocked on the door, it was opened by the pretty, pregnant Adaina woman. “Captain Harg,” she said, surprised. “Come in.”

“Is Tway here?” he asked.

“Yes, I’ll get her.”

He stepped in warily, glad to see that Spaeth was nowhere in sight. He couldn’t face her just yet. Before the woman could call out for Tway, she came into the room, drying her hands on a towel. “Harg!” she exclaimed. “What—”

“Is there a place we can talk? Privately?”

She gestured him to follow her out into the back yard. It was a snug little brick enclosure, entirely surrounded by walls, and shaded by a large oak tree. Once the back door was shut, Tway said in a low voice, “What is it? You look like someone stepped on your grave.”

And so he told her. She was surprised all right, but nowhere near as blindsided as he had been. In fact, she shook her head and said, “This sure explains a lot.”

“Where he was, for one thing,” Harg said. “Tway, how could Tiarch’s people walk in and carry him off without anyone in Yorabay noticing?”

“It must have been those lead prospectors,” she said. “They weren’t looking for lead at all, they were looking for him.”

“And now Tiarch and Talley are quarrelling over who gets to execute him first.”

“They wouldn’t dare,” Tway said firmly.

He tried to laugh at her certainty, but it came out sounding anguished. She put a hand on his arm, as if she had just worked out what this meant for him. “Harg, this means that you—”

“It means I have to figure out what to do,” he said. He felt as if he were in a dream where he had to run and his legs wouldn’t work.

“What’s to figure out?” she said. “We’ve got to help him.”

Maybe it was that simple, he thought. Maybe there really was no nuance in the situation. Whatever the risk, whatever the sacrifice, they just had to help him. “How?” he said.

“What do you mean, ‘how’? You’ve got four warships, you’ve got prisoners, you’ve got half the South Chain behind you!”

And none of it would make the slightest difference, he knew. Not against an implacable empire that refused to bargain. Goth’s only hope lay in ruse and subterfuge. He needed corruption, treachery, and a daring jailbreak. It couldn’t be done from the South Chain. It could only be done from Tornabay. Harg shook his head. “I can’t just abandon what I’ve started here and run off to do something personal.”

“Harg, what makes you think this is personal? Everyone’s been telling you to pay attention to this for a week.”

He realized that she was thinking “Heir of Gilgen” while he was thinking “Goth.” “It’s personal because I wouldn’t do it otherwise,” he said. “I don’t give a rip about the Heir of Gilgen. I give a whole lot of rips about Goth.”

At that, she put her arms around him and hugged him close. He felt like she was infusing him with her strength. When she drew back he kept his hands on her shoulders. “Tway, do you think Spaeth knew?” he said.

She glanced back at the house. “Not unless she’s a lot better liar than I think she is.”

So Goth had deceived her, too. “How could he hide it from us?” Harg said. “This wasn’t a little white lie, Tway. It was a great big lie.”

“Harg, you don’t know enough to blame him,” Tway said. “Let it go. Just forgive him.”

But can I forgive him? Harg wondered. He couldn’t know until he could face him. Forgiveness was not something that could be done in the abstract, from a distance. It had to be reciprocal. Until they could face one another, there was going to be unfinished business between them.

He could think of nothing else till this was resolved. No longer was he fighting a war about occupation or independence. It had become personal.

Heir of Gilgen. Heir of Gilgen. The words pounded in Spaeth’s brain as she sat staring out the rain-pebbled window of Anit’s house.

During daylight hours, she had been spending time in the abandoned upstairs rooms of the building where Anit lived, for it suited her darkening mood. The windows there were mostly boarded over, so that very little light leaked in to illuminate the litter of broken beams and pigeon droppings. For the past week, direct sunlight had sent slivers of pain into her eyes and made her skin blister like poison ivy.

She had been up there when Harg had arrived, and the sound of his voice had drawn her irresistibly to the nearest empty window to listen while he spoke to Tway in the yard below. And so she had learned of Goth’s location, and the identity he had hidden from her. But the most shocking thing she had learned from Harg was that it was possible to be angry at Goth. Now she felt, for the first time, a sense of separation from her creator. He had made her subject to the cruel compulsion of dhota, then gone off to Tornabay, abandoning her. She could feel Harg’s resentment spreading like a dangerous contagion to her own heart.

There was not the slightest doubt in her mind what she had to do. She was only waiting till it was a bit darker to leave the house.

By the gloomy light, she examined her hands. The fingers were black as far as the second knuckle. Her palms had gone dark grey, and unwholesome streaks ran up her wrists. She pulled on the long gloves she had found to hide her hands—from her own sight as well as others’. When she looked up into a small mirror on the wall, she glimpsed behind her own reflection a catlike shadow, her constant companion.

“I have to find him,” she said quietly.

“Yes,” Ridwit said. “You are ready.”

“Will you help me?”

“I will,” the cat said. “Trust me.”

Spaeth reached under the chair where she had secreted the bag holding Goth’s bowl and knife, and a cloak the colour of storm clouds, stolen from Lorin’s room. No one was there to see her leave; Anit was asleep, Lorin was out shopping, and Tway had disappeared somewhere after Harg’s departure. Drawing the hood over her head, Spaeth slipped out the front door. The rain blew into her face, but she paid no attention. Gloomy as the waning day, she walked down the windswept street.

Heir of Gilgen, Heir of Gilgen
, the breakers thrummed along the shore. She could not get it from her mind.

“You humans are so impatient,” the panther said, padding soundless at her side. Her black coat glistened with rain.

“Have you seen my hands?” Spaeth said.

“You have plenty of time yet,” Ridwit drawled. “It has to reach your heart, you know.”

Ahead lay the pier where the cog
Fairweather Friend
was tied. The longshoremen were working in the rain, loading cargo for Tornabay. A man in a raincoat and broad-brimmed hat was supervising the work. Spaeth approached him.