“Good morning, Shajita. It’s been a while,” the witch said, jerking Shaji out of his waking dreamworld. He had been fantasizing about returning home while seeing to the mounts, but that was shattered when Anisa’s voice came from the loft above.
“You! What are you doing here! Do you have any idea what happened to me because of you?” he complained.
“I have heard of your change in station. I don’t care if you blame me for it or not, to be honest. But I might be able to help you improve your lot in life, if you’re interested,” she said. “My employers are interested in Baturya’s movements. I’m supposed to follow him, but unfortunately he’s about as fond of me as you are. Something about getting him stabbed, although that makes about as much sense as me getting you enslaved.”
“I have no idea where he’s going. He’s not going anywhere but in circles. I can’t tell you--”
“That’s fine. I wouldn’t believe you if you told me anyway. I’m more interested in having your help following him. If you help me, then at the end of his journey, I’ll see about buying your contract from him and setting you free.”
Shaji’s eyes widened in surprise, then he narrowed them suspiciously. “How do I know you won’t just sell me to a mine or something like that?”
“I’m a spy, Shaji, but I’m an honest one. I’m not asking you to commit a crime, I’m asking you to help me help the Empire. And the Empire rewards those who help her. I promise, if you help me, I’ll set you free, and I’ll even throw in enough coin to buy a coach-ride back home,” she said.
Shaji licked his lips nervously, glancing towards the direction he knew Baty and the rest of his party were resting. “My family – they’ve disowned me. They know where I am and what happened and they won’t help.”
Anisa clicked her tongue as she considered her problem, then nodded. “I can include a letter declaring you to have performed duties in service to the empire, signed by an official with enough importance to be known to your father and grandfather. If you can’t convince them to take you back with that, I’m afraid that you’re on your own.”
“I-what exactly do you want me to do?” Shaji asked.
Anisa grinned, and began to explain to him the various methods of marking a trail.
~~~~~~~~~~
“I still say we just shouldn’t have gotten involved,” Baty was saying, throwing himself into the saddle and pouting. “Now we have that woman following us.”
“That woman can hear you,” Jazirqe reminded him from ten paces back.
“I don’t care!” Baturya reminded her. “Aren’t you supposed to be a spy? If you’re going to follow me, can’t you do it from the shadows or something?”
“Then I couldn’t hear if you said anything important,” she pointed out. “Such as if you were going to try to lose me again, as you have every day for the last two weeks.”
“That’s exactly why I wish you were following from the shadows,” Baturya shouted at her.
Gyre just smiled and shook his head. They had been released to travel after the criminal they had brought to justice had plead guilty, but despite the fact that they hadn’t had a set destination Baturya remained upset over the delay. Or perhaps it was over the addition of their latest companion, to whom he was directing constant complaints and insults.
“We captured a traitor to the empire,” Gyre reminded him. “The reward was quite substantial, and it looks good, both for the Sect, and us personally.”
“Yeah, well, I still say we shouldn’t have gotten involved,” Baturya complained.
“Have you considered that you were destined to get involved?” Gyre questioned. “After all, it was your sword which led us to that particular situation.”
The teenager had no ready answer to that line of reasoning.
“What happened is what happened,” Ita chimed in cheerfully. “There is no point in looking at the past and saying ‘I wish I had done this instead,’ ‘I was a fool to do this,’ or ‘next time I will do something other than that.’ There is no changing the past.”
“Yeah, well, I still say we shouldn’t have gotten involved. Honestly, I don’t know how she keeps finding us after we lose her. It’s like she’s got a tracking charm on us, but I can’t sense any foreign ki on any of our kit,” the boy complained.
Shaji essentially gave himself away with his expression when he heard those words. Fortunately nobody was paying attention to him. When he had agreed to help the woman track the party, he had assumed that she would be doing so from a distance, and discreetly. However, the way that the arrangement was irking Baturya was payment in and of itself. Besides, it’s not like he was committing a crime, or causing anybody anymore harm than moderate annoyance.
“I have super secret spy powers,” Jazirqe said in a bland voice. “I’d explain them in more detail, but they’re super secret.”
Baturya scoffed. “You probably marked our horse’s shoes or something so that we leave tracks that stand out in the road. Let’s visit a farrier the next time we find a village large enough to have one.”
“Oh no, my super secret is out,” Jaz complained in that same voice. “Now I’m forced to simply use one of my other nine-hundred and ninety-nine super secret powers.”
Gyre chuckled. It was nice having young companions.
There was a mendicant with his bowl out at the next crossroads. Each of the four cultivators bowed to the monk and tossed a coin into his bowl. Even Shaji bowed, although he was exempt from the offering due to his status. The mendicant did not look up from his prayer, or acknowledge them in any way. Gyre was somewhat impressed, as it was uncommon to see a monk so devoted to his vocation. Especially when all four of the coins offered were silver ren.
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Technically the monk was not being impolite. The prayers he was offering to the divine were more important than any mortal conversation they might offer. If they were seeking a blessing or guidance or any of the services which mendicants were expected to provide, then they were expected to wait.
Baturya wasn’t willing to wait. He dismounted and pulled his sword out of its sheath to complete the ritual that he had been performing at every crossroads since they had left the Tuth farm six weeks ago. Except that this time, the sword did not fall. It stood tall and proud, as though he had stuck it firmly into the ground, which he had not.
Then, after an eternal moment, it angled and fell towards the monk, who had never looked up or stopped muttering his prayers once during the boy’s ritual.
“I’ll be damned,” Jaz said. She hadn’t really believed the boy’s superstition, but if she didn’t know better she’d say that sort of looked like divine intervention. Or divine direction, or something divine. “Has it ever done that before?”
“It’s wobbled occasionally,” Gyre admitted. “Never anything like that, though.”
“I guess we’re supposed to talk to him,” Baturya said. “At least, that’s what Qikobi did when his sword pointed towards me.”
“Did his stand on end for an entire minute, like yours did just now?” Gyre inquired.
“No, that was weird,” Baturya admitted. “I guess it’s very important that we talk to the monk. Um, after he finishes his prayers, I guess.”
After twenty minutes, it became obvious that the monk was in no rush to hurry on their account.
~~~~~~~~
Unoro awoke coughing, his private cabin filled with smoke. He panicked, looking around for the fire, but the source of the smoke was not in his room. Rather, it was coming from the hallway. Panicked, he rushed over to open the door, and was grabbed by a hand of iron.
“Fancy nightclothes, lad,” the stranger said. “You got anybody who’ll pay a ransom for you?”
“I, what?”
“We’ve taken the ship. You slept through the violence like the lazy rich lad you are. Now the only question is whether you’re worth more as a ransom or being sold off in the south as a slave. So, answer the question. Have you anybody who will pay a ransom for you, boy?”
“I don’t understand, what is happening? Where is the fire?”
“Oh, we have the fire under control, don’t worry. The ship is ours. Don’t want to burn it too much before we have a chance to sell it. Pirates, lad. You’ve been taken by pirates. Now answer the damn question so I know which hold to throw you in. Although you should know we don’t like it when our captives lie to us about what they’re worth.”
Unoro’s mind finally caught up to his situation, and he cursed inside. “I’m worth more to you as a free man than a slave. I’m traveling on behalf of the Makavians. My letters of credit are worthless without me. I’ll pay you five hundred Ren to set me free.”
“Five hundred, ey? That’s enough to talk to the captain it is. Come along lad, we’re switching ships.”
“My letters are in my luggage,” Unoro protested. “Give me a moment to--”
“Oy! Katal! Search this man’s room, grab his luggage and any papers you can find. Says he’s worth five hundred empire silver he is, but only if he has his papers.”
Unoro tried to protest further, but the man cuffed him and dragged him along. The force of the man’s blow made it clear that he was an Awakened, at least, as it left Unoro dazed and nauseous. The young attendant was a soft man, having not so much as wrestled since he was a young boy. He entertained little thought of fighting back, especially if the pirates truly had control of the ship.
Still, as he was dragged across the plank connecting the pirate ship to the passenger ship he’d started his journey on, he forced his mind to clear as he tried to calculate a way out of this mess. The pirates weren’t killing everyone at least. True, they were talking about enslaving them instead, but even so Unoro was confident that he could convince anyone who bought him from the pirates that it would be more profitable to sell him back to the Makavians than to keep him.
He was a little surprise when the captain of the pirate ship was sitting at a desk nailed into the aft of his ship, writing an inventory as it was reported to him by one of the boarders.
“The sailors that surrendered are worth the most, of course. Always good money in sailors who know which way the wind is blowing,” the man was saying. “The rest of the slaves won’t be worth much at auction, but a few of them might ransom well.”
“This lad says he’s got papers worth five hundred empire silver. Says he’ll turn those papers into coin for us if we let him go,” Unoro’s captor said, interrupting the exchange.
“Five hundred?” The captain didn’t even look up. “Is that all? Put him with the others.”
“I can get more!” Unoro protested. “I work for the Makavians. I’m on a mission for them, and they’ll see this as just another business expense. Just name your price!”
“The Makavians?” This got the captain’s attention where the paltry sum had failed. “They’re an eastern family. What are they doing sending an errand boy to the west?”
“I’m looking for one of the grandsons of the patriarch. He went missing on his way to Shefdon two years ago, and we’ve got word of his location. I’m traveling to bring him home,” Unoro explained. He had little doubt that the pirates would be going through his papers, so he told the version of the truth which would be backed up his journal.
The captain tapped his stylus against the desk, frowning. “The Makavians. Makavians. Dammit. It had to be the Makavians. Bring me a pigeon, I need to send a message.”
The pirate who had been reporting to the captain earlier grunted and disappeared into the hold, while the captain turned a predatory gaze at Unoro. It was more than a gaze, however, and the young man felt the weight of an oppressive aura upon him. The aura of a powerful cultivator.
“I’m afraid I’m going to need quite a few more details about your mission. I need to figure out if it’s something my employers would want me to expedite or prevent.”
Unoro felt a sinking sensation in his gut as a suspicion crawled into his head. “Your employers, did they have the oldest grandson, Kasbel Makavian, murdered?”
“I wouldn’t claim to know every body they’ve put in the ground,” the captain said dismissively. “I do not know that they did do such a thing, but I also do not know that they did not. I’m part of the naval efforts, you see. I wouldn’t know how they’re destabilizing the empire’s land routes. Assassinating the heir to a powerful family like the Makavians might be part of the effort, or it might not be. Now then, your mission. I’d like all the details, if you don’t mind, starting with when the boy went missing. The unofficial version, if you value your ability to breath air instead of seawater.”
“I’ll tell you,” Unoro said, “Because I don’t give a crap about the little shit I’m supposed to rescue. But my price is the name of Kasbel’s murderer. Tell me that and I’ll--”
His captor, the one who had dragged him from his cabin, punched him in the gut hard enough to lift him off his feet.
“You’ll answer our questions, or we’ll dangle you behind the ship from a rope for a while,” the captain said conversationally. “Besides, it’s like I said. I truly don’t know if my organization was involved in your friend’s death or not. Now then, the details please. When and where did the boy go missing, and why was he so far west of home?”
Unoro was not a man meant for violence. Neither the giving nor receiving of it. Once he had recovered his breath, he began to speak, and he held nothing back.