Amaranth shone high above the jagged waters of the Divide, its lighthouses visible leagues away. Their uneven scattering across the flat shelves of Vas’s sheer walls did little to make the port marginally more inviting than a storm in open waters.
Catharina regarded the still distant city from atop the Wild Summer’s crow’s nest. She’d never seen Amaranth from across the water before, had never turned to regard it when heading out to Nen. It had been a place to rest at, charter a ship, and move away from.
Just a stop on a long road.
Now she cast her eyes across its great expanse and saw what it could be. Amaranth held potential for greatness. It was an ugly place for now, a growth atop Vas’s tall cliffs, like moss clinging to the rocks and spreading into ravines and gorges. Spray off the Calis’s waterfall obstructed most of it in the right wind, to leave visible only the many lighthouses shining their beacons to incoming ships.
It could be much more. Her mind’s eye imagined the great shipyards of the Dominion overlaid over the barren rocks, the song of industry and the glory of progress.
Here, on the spillage of the Calis into the Divide, humans had shown their ingenuity. What the aelir accomplished with illum, humans made do with chisel and hammer, wood and stone, gears and pulleys.
They’d be upon the port in just a few short days, and plans would stir into motion. Her heart fluttered in anticipation, but her stomach drew inward with all the ways in which she might fail.
“Cat, ya up there?” Captain Pascal’s voice called out from the deck beneath.
“I’m here,” she answered, looking over the edge of the nest.
The captains had gathered on the Summer and they all stared up at her. They could’ve been in port days before, but wither winds hadn’t been kind all across the journey, as if Isadora herself was loath to leave her be. Now, they stayed at anchor two days’ way from Amaranth, waiting for the winds to come back and drive them the rest of the journey. After the purge there were precious few who could take up the oars, and she needed them for other tasks.
Catharina didn’t mind the delay. It had allowed her precious time for planning. For the captains of the ship, however, aside from Pascal, it was a delay to their profits, each day another lost opportunity of setting across the Divide with a fresh haul.
She climbed down the ratlines as nimble as if she’d been sliding down the vines of the Olden. For a moment, hanging nearly weightless off the rigging, she felt almost as if she were back on Nen and things were as before, just another day of service to the aelir’matar and her endless scheming.
The spray off a cresting wave washed across the railing as her boots hit the deck. The first breeze in three days rustled her hair, a soft, salty wind whispering across their furled sails. Pascal did not issue his orders just yet and the men remained at their station, brows beady with the sweat of a calm day at sea.
“Lady,” the three captains greeted her.
Only Pascal extended his hand and she shook it. The others exchanged heavy glances and reluctantly did as the captain of the Summer. Catharina didn’t need to reach out for their thoughts to know of their unease and worries.
“Let’s get out of the sun,” she suggested. “I’ve had quite enough of baking in it.” She’d developed a dark tan that’d probably not fade all the way into Aztroa.
Pascal led them into his quarters and shut the heavy door behind. He took a seat, groaning as he eased his wooden leg up on a stool.
“You look gloomy, sirs,” Catharina said as she moved to the oaken table dominating the centre of the room. “Silver for your thoughts?”
Captain Alonius held command over the Faer Lady, and Ulita held the Dragon’s Skull. Rough, stoic men on their best days. Both had sailed the Divide for longer than Catharina had been alive, just as the Wild Summer had. These men weren’t used to silence, giving or receiving.
“Lady Catharina—” Alonius began.
She raised a finger and cut him off. “Catharina is fine, sirs. I will not stand on absurd protocol when we’re to plan bloodletting.”
That hit them like a bolt of lightning and both straightened a bit too much, jaws clenching. They shared a look. Before either found a working tongue in his head, she went on, “We are planning murder, sirs. In the history books it will be called quite differently, but for now we are going to kill quite a number of important people. Speak your minds or I will think them made up.”
She favoured them both with a long, quiet stare. “Well?”
Ulita swallowed heavily and finally spoke. “How will you take a city with ten men, Catharina? You have my support, undoubtedly, and that of the Skull. But we are three ships against the armada of Amaranth. You have ten men to the armies of seven lords.” He shook his head and his earrings clinked. “How is this not madness?”
Her gaze swung to Alonius and the large man seemed to shrink and wither. “Do you also believe it madness?” she asked, though she knew the answer.
“Well… I… Yes. We are loyal men, Catharina. Loyal to your Lord father and loyal to what’s left of Aztroa Magnor. But what you suggest…”
In the nearly sixty days of crossing the Divide, Alonius had made his complaint about her plans exactly ten times. This would be his eleventh. He had the good grace to at least not make her suffer through another repetition of the same theme.
Maybe in sight of the city they believed her resolve would have withered, seen sense. Maybe she would simply disembark and be on her merry way North.
She almost giggled.
Of course, their concern was far simpler. Amaranth was a safe port. It was a rich port and a welcoming den for people like them. Catharina entertained no illusions that these two men would be loyal to anything but their pockets. Heinrich had paid them well, of course, but human greed had a bottomless quality to it.
And she was to take several of their best men. They came willingly to her cause when she’d asked for volunteers, and that galled their captains.
She turned her gaze to Pascal. “You, Captain?” He was the only one among them that represented a great holding. He took his cue well.
A smile played beneath the man’s whiskers as he leaned over and opened a drawer on the side of his table. Two sealed leather envelops slid across the polished wood towards the other two. He gestured for them to open and verify the contents.
“What’s this?” Alonius picked up the one envelope addressed to him and opened it His one good eye went wide.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“You want to buy our ships?” Ulita shared in his colleague’s amazement. He checked the document again. “For nearly double what they’re worth?”
Catharina flashed him a smile. Double? Fully crewed and captained? This was five times what each ship was worth. He knew it and she feigned ignorance.
“Aye,” Pascal answered simply. “You both can go ashore, somewhere else but here, or remain under my command. It don’t matter much, long as you keep your gobs shut. And there won’t be a better offer anywhere on the shores of the Divide.”
“Why?” Alonius set down the paper and inspected the seals and signatures on it. Assurances for the sum made by the Valonia Holding. The Bank of Diolo ensuring the claims. All in order. All prepared well in advance.
These men had pledged themselves to an escort mission to retrieve a woman from the aelir Dominion. Nothing more. They’d bellyached and complained from the first moment Pascal had approached them, and only saw the value of the proposal when gold had passed hands. Catharina did not expect the barest sliver of loyalty from them, not in the way that she could use. And no plan, no matter how meticulous, would be accepted by two sea dogs standing to lose their comforts.
“Why what?” she asked. Ignorance was a valuable weapon to be plied against men like them.
“Why do this? You could have—you could have bought the men you mean to kill with this money.”
“Is the sum unsatisfactory?” Catharina turned her smile in his direction, eyes pinning him. Her power reached out and caressed the surface of his mind. “I was assured this was enough for you to retire to wherever you wished and live in the lap of luxury for the rest of your days.”
“It is. But… why?” Alonius gripped the contract as if afraid someone might snatch it away.
“I need ships to carry men once the work is done. Yours will do. I need captains. You will do, if you pledge yourself to me.”
It spoke of the late Heinrich’s paranoia that he hadn’t hired all three captains from the same Holding. Instead, he’d chartered Valonia’s best ship and her captain, together with two freelancers to guard it against the aelir. The tools he’d left her were not the best, but they’d do for now.
“For what purpose, my Lady?” Ulita was quicker on the uptake.
Greed kicked up an electric tempest across his mind, as loud as thunder to Catharina’s senses. He would be useful to her designs, sure enough.
Alonius remained pensive. She could push him, make the decision much easier with a thought, but he’d be worthless. A whipped dog bid its time to bite the hand that struck it.
“Same plans you already know. I aim to take this city for my own.”
“But our ships can’t sail the Calis. They sit too low in the water. You can’t take them on your journey.”
“I’m aware, sirs, of what your craft can or can’t do. Do not presume to lecture me.”
Alonius recoiled from her tone. Ulita held his ground.
“This is a very generous offer,” he said. Greed threaded his thoughts. “The Skull is yours. I will remain its captain to serve Aztroa Magnor.”
“I accept your service.” Her eyes turned to Alonius and she waited.
It didn’t take long for his own nature to assert itself. He drew out the moment, for his own ego’s benefit no doubt. A proud, fallible man to the core. In time she would replace their position and squirrel away the both of them. Greedy men would not benefit her long-term goals, but they would serve for the first steps towards…
She didn’t finish the thought. Wouldn’t. The weakened god’s fingers danced on her shoulders and his whispers filled her head. She would not allow him to cloud her mind with delusions of grandeur. First, a foothold. Nothing more.
“The Lady is yours, Catharina.” Alonius inclined his head. “May we all head to more than a hangman’s noose.”
If things went sour, they would betray her. It was written in the electric storm of their thoughts, the expectation that she would fail and they would keep the money and the ships. A pulse sent a sharp spike of pain down a very particular nerve.
Both winced. Alonius gripped the edge of the table and squeezed his eye shut.
“Do not believe me naive, sirs. Another has made the mistake already. That will be all.” She turned from them and gazed out the porthole at her two new ships. Their flags flapped in the gathering wind. Somewhere, at the edge of the horizon, dark clouds gathered.
The god’s whispers would be right after all.
“Return to your ships. We’re heading into port with first light tomorrow. Be prepared.”
Pascal had them signing documents of employment and acquisition and shook their hands when they departed. Vas’s fleets were small by comparison to those of the aelir, and many clustered around Amaranth itself. Valonia Holding was based in Calabran, one of the few that sailed under Aztroa’s flag. And it may be the only one loyal to the Voc Anghan name rather than the city’s history.
Her father had once been a great man. Not much remained of his legacy.
“You don’t trust them,” Pascal said as he returned to the room. His leg bothered him. She could help ease the ache, but he’d refused every time she’d offered.
“I do trust their greed. For now."
“You will profit from it.”
She let out a low grunt of displeasure. There was no need to put the two ships at risk for what was to come, but it would be strange to send them back out to sea right away. She’d establish her own foothold here and send out Pascal’s overland letters at the end.
“Their ballistae will be trained on the Summer the moment I walk down the gangplank,” she said. “I expect you know that.”
“Aye. I don’t doubt they’d loose on me if you looked to fail.”
“You really think they’d wait that long?”
“Aye. At least that. Won’t risk your displeasure otherwise.” He grinned widely. “You succeeding only to hunt them down later isn’t something either wants to risk. If you die, I die. Easy as.”
A simple formula.
Aboard the Summer there were three of the men who were to join her on shore. They walked in soon after the captains departed. Rough men. Trustworthy. They understood the work to come better than any of the others.
“We’re as ready as we’re likely to get,” Gheeor spoke up. He was the tallest of the three, towering a full head above everyone else in the room. He’d come down from Aztroa Magnor with Heinrich but hadn’t served the snake. Blue-eyed, dark-haired, and fair skinned, he cut an imposing figure in any crowd. He would be her bodyguard.
“Good,” Catharina answered, not looking up from the map of Amaranth. “Anyone lose their water yet?”
She was answered by a low chuckle and it was Caragill that answered. “No, Lady Cat. I’ve checked everyone.”
“Poor choice of words, Caragill.”
“Everything is prepared and checked.” He suppressed a smile and it made his Rian accent all the stronger, colouring his words in strange tones and inflections. She’d gotten used to his speech. He was to lead the group aboard the Skull.
“My men await your signal.”
Kehtan was her last commander. He’d been bought by Heinrich. Catharina knew of him from her girlhood days. They’d interacted once, a lifetime before. He was a scion of House Var Karin. Fourth of seven brothers. Disowned. A drunkard. She’d given him three of her ten men.
She nodded and beckoned them closer to the map sprawled on the table. Seven points were marked upon it.
“Anything else you’d like to discuss now? Before we start the killing?” she asked.
Two marks on the map for each group. A seventh for all of them. A single night available for easy work before the bars came down and the shutters locked tight.
Caragill and Kehtan shook their heads and each showed his targets and agreed-upon routes. Catharina’s plans, she liked to think, were simple affairs with simple outcomes: they would all succeed and survive, or they would all die. Only two sides to a blade. As her aelir’matar had taught her: succeed or die, anything else is only distraction.
“We are heading to shore with first light. Be about your duties.” She tapped a finger on the largest dot marked on the map. “I will see you all at the River Lord’s home. Good hunting.”