Tris's Book

Sandry, whose uncle was a pirate-chaser, leaned over her friend. "What kind of shalandiru?" she asked, watching Briar gently smooth ointment on Daja's cut. Interesting, she thought. The weal on her own cheek was hurting less. "How many, Daja?"

"Front rank, ten dromons," whispered Daja. "Placed every other one with single-bank galleys." She sighed.

"Front rank? There were more?" Sandry asked.

"It's a fleet, saati" whispered Daja. "I didn't get a good look at the second rank, or third - but they have them. I'm so tired."

"What's a dromon?" Tris wanted to know.

"Two banks of oars," Briar and Sandry replied at the same time.

"Most galleys just have the one," Sandry continued. "Dromons are bigger."

"And they have the thunder-weapon." Daja opened her eyes and tried to sit up. None of them helped her. At last she surrendered. "Frostpine?"

"Rosethorn's room." Briar jerked his head in the proper direction. "He's as melted as you."

"What thunder-weapon?" Sandry asked Daja, frowning. "Was it that boom-thing we heard?"

"It sank one of the Duke's galleys." A tear rolled slowly down one of Daja's cheeks, leaving a clean track in the grime. "It tore the sailors to pieces, and blew a hole in the keel. We saved a few, but our boat was nearly full to start. Oti Bookkeeper give them credit, and send them to a kinder berth."

"A catapult-stone would hole a ship," Briar pointed out. "You don't need thunder for that."

"A stone" - Daja yawned, her eyes sliding shut - "doesn't rip people and planks to shreds and fire the hold."

Tris started at this description of it. Leaning forward, she wrapped a hand around Daja's wrist. "Wait. This smoke, that's all over you and Frostpine." She ran a finger down the other girl's arm. It came away sooty. "This black stuff. The smell - it's not just wood smoke. Is that your thunder-weapon? It makes this stink?"

Daja nodded, and slept again.

"Briar! Tris! I need you!" Rosethorn called, her voice sharp. "Now, not tomorrow!"

Briar placed his salve on the desk, along with the water and cloths, and headed for the door. Turning back, he saw that Sandry was stroking Daja's hand, looking thoughtful. Tris was sniffing her finger. She had gone a strange shade of pale under skin reddened from yesterday's time in the sun. "That isn't Lark who wants us," the boy prodded. "Let's go, before she gets testy."

Chapter Eight

Ten minutes later, Briar and Tris set out along the spiral road, both carrying empty baskets and message-slates: Briar's for Gorse, Tris's for Moonstream. Rosethorn had ordered special foods for Daja and Frostpine, while both she and Lark felt that the Dedicate Superior ought to know what now lay before Summersea harbour.

"Dedicate Moonstream?" Briar asked a passing dedicate in Fire red.

"South Gate," she replied, and hurried on.

People and carts streamed by them on the road as they walked. These were local farmers, come to shelter inside Winding Circle's thick, high walls. In a way, Briar was glad to see them - it was like being in Hajra, though much cleaner. Little Bear and Tris did not agree. The dog was simply miserable; he had begun life as a stray in Summersea, and had bad memories of crowds. Tris took each brush, each bump, each wait as a personal insult, her face getting redder and redder. Briar noticed that the wind had picked up, blowing every which-way. He said nothing - the breeze helped ease the day's growing heat - but he kept an eye on his housemate. If she got too out-of-temper, he supposed he would have to make her give way, somehow.

Near South Gate, the crowds evaporated. None of the refugees seemed to want to get too close to the cove and whatever lay in it. The woodshops and forges between the Water and Fire temples, however, worked at full capacity. To the left, in the yard around the school for physical training run by the Fire temple, red-robed dedicates and white-robed novices drilled with swords, wide-bladed spears and shields. Many of the boys that Briar knew from his short stay in their dormitory were holding their own weapons practice. There were a few girls among the boys; more girls and women wore red or white, and drilled as warriors.

Other red-garbed dedicates, in metal-studded leather jerkins and helmets, lounged around the South Gate, weapons close at hand. The gate was closed and barred with huge timbers. In the deep tunnel that ran from it through the wall, both Tris and Briar saw the blaze of magic. Power shone from the many round stones embedded in the mortar that lined the tunnel walls.

"Here - you two - scat!" yelled an armoured dedicate. She wore the sleeves of her crimson habit tied up, baring arms as muscled as those of any blacksmith. For all Briar knew, she was a blacksmith, like so many Fire dedicates. "This is no place for you!"

Triumphantly Briar held up the pass-token that Lark had given him before he and Tris left Discipline. Unlike the iron one, this was made of precious glass, with Lark's and Rosethorn's marks pressed into the sides. Lark had also tied a red silk cord so that it formed a cross on both sides of the round. That would get them anywhere in temple grounds, she had told them.

The dedicate took it, looked it over, then spat on the ground. "The dog stays here," she ordered. "The baskets, too. Keep out from under people's feet on the wall. If you're ordered off, I'd better not hear that you argued. Who're you looking for?"