Cold Steel

We slid backward into the smoke. The jaw closed.

Darkness fell as a smothering blanket. Strange noises like drones and squeaks drifted at the edge of my hearing.

Bee and I sat on the chest, clutching each other. Rory leaned against us as if he wanted to climb inside either the chest or us. His trembling shuddered through me. I rubbed his head.

From my oldest, sleepiest memories I scoured out a song. It whispered in my mother’s raspy voice, scarred by war and pain. I sang in a low voice.

Sleep, sweet child, as the twilight falls

As the bright day takes its rest.

Let the Wild Hunt search, let the Wild Hunt cry,

I shall hide you at my breast.

“Cat, are you crying?” Bee whispered, pressing her cheek to mine. “What is that lullaby?”

“My mother used to sing it to me.”

The creature moved in a gentle undulation. The air stirred with a rhythmic pulse, in time to the slow drum of its heart, like the breath of secrets untold. Atop it floated a sound like a bell’s resonant ring drawn out as a thread is spun out of a mass of wool. I trembled, struck by such an upwelling of fear at being trapped inside a living beast that I took a slug from my flask of rum for fortitude. The only way to battle the fear was to talk.

“Bee, how could you think I would go with Camjiata? He probably meant to throw me overboard once we were out of sight of land.”

She tensed. “It’s not that simple. He told me you’ve never given him a chance to properly explain. He got you exiled to Salt Island to protect you.”

“To protect me?” I snorted. “How can he say these things? And with such sincerity! It’s like a disease with him. Protect himself, he means, since he believes I will be the instrument of his death.” Rory gave a rumble and nosed against me as I went on. “ ‘Where the hand of fortune branches, Tara Bell’s child must choose, and the road of war will be washed by the tide.’ The general thinks my choice will be to kill him. But I already made a choice on Hallows’ Night at the ballcourt. I was the instrument of the cacica’s death, not his.”

“That’s not what he thinks.” Bee’s tone wound like darkness, mellow and soft. The heat made me yawn. “He thinks it’s the choice you made between Andevai Diarisso and James Drake, between cold mage and fire mage. James Drake has an ugly, unpredictable temper that might have been soothed by the love of a good woman.”

“I hope he did not really say that, and in those nauseating words.” I took another slug of rum. “The point is, the general could have entirely misunderstood his wife’s words about Tara Bell’s child. She wrote down her dreams in garbled poetry. He interprets everything as having some relationship to him. I’m quite sure the dream has nothing to do with me choosing between two men… what a tired story that would be!”

Yet what if it referred to the same choice my mother had been forced to make? What if my sire meant to force me to sleep with him to save Vai’s life, as he had forced my mother to have sex with him to save the lives of Daniel and the other men in the Baltic Ice Expedition?

“Cat, why are you shaking? I’m sorry I said anything.”

I swallowed a huge gulp of rum. Some things I refused to speak of even to Bee. “The point is, James Drake has stayed alive this long by murdering unwilling people as catch-fires. Beggars, the rootless poor, people no one will miss. Salters and dying men. Meanwhile, the general means to allow Drake to go on killing people as long as it helps him win the war he means to wage in Europa. That’s why Drake obeys him, because he knows Camjiata will turn a blind eye to his crimes. Who will miss enemy soldiers who perish in war? So how can we trust Camjiata, knowing he employs a criminal like James Drake?”

“Listen! After Caonabo divorced me, I went to the general. I really didn’t have anywhere else to go, as you can imagine. Of course I demanded to know what his intentions are toward you. He promised me that you have nothing to fear from him. Your life is his life. As long as you are alive, he knows he is alive. The general has offered us employment as spies and couriers in his army.”

“I’m not spying for the general!”

“How do you plan to eat? In what bed do you plan to sleep with your handsome husband? Do you have any money at all, Cat?”

“No,” I admitted sullenly. I groped for the flask, but Bee had hidden it. “Didn’t Caonabo give you a dower, some pittance from the Taino treasury?”

“Why, yes, he rewarded me very generously. I was granted the right to collect taxes from two towns on the northern coast of Kiskeya. It’s a fine income, but one I have no access to. I received also several thousand cowrie shells, which make me quite wealthy in the Taino kingdom but are worth nothing in Europa. A chest full of exceptionally fine cloth, as well as several crates of excellent tobacco. All of which are on the ship you and I were meant to sail on, together with Vai’s other chests. We’re destitute, Cat. We haven’t a single sestertius to our name. All we have is the gear that is in this chest, which fortunately is the one Luce packed for you.”