Cold Steel

“I haven’t yet had the leisure to make an accounting!”

We moved deeper into the night of the spirit world. Vast roots tangled around us.

“By the way, I’m sorry to mention it, but General Camjiata took your father’s journals.”

This newest betrayal scarcely scratched my already jangling nerves. “Of course he would! At least I know he’ll keep them safe.”

“We need to go quiet here,” murmured the opia as we began to descend. “For I would not want any to hear me who might put a stop to the business we’s about.”

“Shh,” I said to Bee. My breathing grew ragged as we made our way down within the tree, for I both hoped and feared that I would again grasp the latch and see into the coach where Vai was my sire’s prisoner. But all we did was descend step by step, me holding the opia’s hand as he guided us and Bee linked to me by the chest. Rory padded at the rear.

I smelled the mire of earth and heard the moan of a conch shell being blown. I heard the thump and patter of batey and the cheering shouts of the crowd as one of the players scored. Yet we did not walk into the ceremonial plaza where I had been before.

Down we went and down farther yet, past the charcoal scent of a cook fire and a smell of pepperpot that made me lick my lips with hunger. Rory gave a rumble of displeasure, reminding me that he was hungry, too.

“Don’ stop.” The opia fastened his fingers tightly to mine. “We shall go deeper, into the realm of the old ones that lie below all.”

“What is that voice? Where are we going?” Bee whispered.

I had no words with which to answer her. The black void around us was impenetrable. Warm water tickled over my sandaled feet and streamed off. A salty wind with a bellows’ breath hissed against my face like the exhalation of a beast so huge it cannot be seen or touched.

Was this what it meant to crawl into the maw of Leviathan?

I felt as if the gullet of a beast were squeezing around me. Sand filtered into my eyes. I blinked, trying to wet away its scrape.

Beneath my sandals the ground crunched. Glimmers of light shot through the earth like sparks strewn through sand. The walls took on an amber gleam. Rory loped ahead toward a low cave mouth. The shush and sough of a stormy sea sounded from outside. But I did not taste the salt of the ocean. Instead, when I licked my lips, I swallowed smoke.

The opia stopped.

Bee and I set down the chest.

She stared at him. “Blessed Tanit! He looks exactly like Andevai!”

He looked her up and down in a way Vai had never once examined her. A sting of jealousy made my heart flame, for unlike every other man I had ever met, Andevai had never shown the least partiality for Bee, not as all the rest did the moment they laid eyes on her voluptuous beauty.

“’Tis a shame I can go no farther and thereby get to know yee better, dream walker,” he said to Bee. “Ask from the old ones that which they owe to yee.”

“Where are we?” I whispered, for I was afraid.

“We have reached the Great Smoke, where the old ones bide. In the mortal world, in the language spoken in Expedition, it is called the ocean.”

“Have you tricked us? We have no ship on which to sail the ocean.”

“’Tis no trick, for here in the spirit world, it have a different substance,” he said in another man’s voice.

We looked onto the face of a man I had never before met. He was Taino through and through, no mixed-race Expeditioner. He had the long black hair and regular features typical of the Taino. His commanding gaze had a hard measure, but a softness in the line of his mouth suggested that kisses pleased him. He was older than I expected, about the same age as the Europan radical leader and pugilist Brennan Touré Du, whom I would have guessed to be in his mid-thirties, a man in his prime. He also looked vaguely familiar.

“Have we met before?”

“We have not. Yee killed me before we had that chance.”

“I did not kill you! You aren’t one of the salters I killed on Salt Island…” I trailed off, watching the promise of his mouth tighten to disapproval.

“I’ve seen you!” cried Bee. “I met you, the first time I went to Sharagua! But you’re dead!”

Had the sun come up at that moment, I would have said that dawn broke upon me. “You’re the cacique! Queen Anacaona’s brother, the one she was keeping alive. You’re Caonabo and Haübey’s uncle.”

The crow’s-feet at his eyes deepened as he smiled. “A smart gal, too.”

“No need to mock me. How comes it that you ruled the Taino kingdom and yet speak the language spoken in Expedition Territory, which is but a trifling place compared to the expanse of your noble and mighty empire?”