“But wasn’t it totally discredited?”
“Of course. But this is some new version. Look, we have to let her go. She’s starting to get antsy, and I don’t want to do a major rewire of her brain. But get ready because I’ve prodded her mind to think about Sentinel. Give her half a chance and she’ll spill.”
“I’m ready.” Cassy withdrew from the other woman’s mind and summoned up a bright smile. The woman blinked and looked slightly dazed. “Is … something wrong?” Cassy asked gently.
“I … I don’t know. I thought …” The gray-haired woman broke off and gave an awkward laugh. “It’s nothing. What did you say?”
Cassy gave her a dazzling, self-deprecating smile. “I was just saying I’m still a little awed by all of this.”
The woman rubbed at her temple as if she was developing a headache. “It’s understandable. Now you’d better—”
“You know what amazes me most?” Cassy interrupted confidingly. “It’s how many different nationalities you see here. Chinon, Gadfian, Tipodan.” She shook her head. “Somehow I never expected that much cooperation.”
The woman laughed dryly. “There is not that much cooperation. The mix is mostly due to the Sentinel project. I’m sure you’ve heard about it. All five powers are involved, so there are scientists from every country here to work on the project, as well as a lot of suits and bean counters from those places whose job it is to observe everyone else doing their jobs and then report to their various governments. But there are a few other projects where scientists from different powers are cooperating. Mine is one. That’s one of the things I love about science. The fact that it’s possible to work across those invisible boundaries.” She glanced at her watch. “I’ll walk you back to where you went wrong. You must have missed the sign. It doesn’t exactly leap out at you.”
I saw Cassy scowl as the mind now probing her said with a languid sneer, “If you had just gone the other way like I suggested, this wouldn’t have happened.”
I caught the probe as it withdrew and followed it back to a girl sitting slumped in a chair in a distant corner of the complex. I withdrew to look at her and was astonished. For all the cynical feel of her mindvoice, she was no older than Cassy, and she was extraordinary looking. Her skin was as pale as if it had been powdered with flour, her lips were black, and she had smeared something glittering and purple around her eyes. Her hair was short like the older woman in the hall, but it had been oiled and pressed into quills that stuck up as stiffly as if they had been lacquered. Finally, a silver bead of metal gleamed in the tuck of her chin, and a little silver arrow pierced the exaggerated arch of one black brow.
“Well?” she said aloud in an insolent, rasping voice.
The people around the chair had been standing still. I looked at them and realized with some astonishment that each wore the same sort of heavy blue trousers with pockets and soft short-sleeved white shirts as I had worn in the ruins complex. I studied each in turn, realizing with awe that these must be the Beforetime Misfits stolen from the original Reichler Clinic. There was a frail-looking woman with wispy blond hair and anxious eyes; a handsome man with a belligerent expression; a worried-looking older man whose face seemed familiar, and a heavy older woman with gray streaks in her hair. All of them save the girl in the chair had skin like Cassy’s: Twentyfamilies dark. The only other person in the room was a younger boy with yellowish hair and a wheezing way of breathing. He was fair-skinned, too, but I was struck by his dual-colored eyes of green and blue, for they were like Iriny’s. He was the only one other than the pale girl with the porcupine-quill hair who appeared calm. The rest wore expressions ranging from frightened to apprehensive.
“Well?” asked the big woman eagerly.
The girl with the spiked hair stretched luxuriantly and then shook her head. “She didn’t get anything. She let herself get sidetracked by one of the geeks.”
Without warning, a sharp pain broke the bubble of dream material open, and silver drops shuddered back into the mindstream as I was drawn rapidly up and away.
Maruman was watching me when I opened my eyes, flexing his claws. I glared at him. “Did you do that?”
“Your stomach woke me,” he answered coolly.
I glanced across at the windows and saw by the hue of the sunlight striping the sill that it was late afternoon. I got up, stripped off the rumpled silk clothes that I had slept in, and splashed my face with water. Feeling more alert, I found a heavier silk shirt and trousers in vivid violet-blues and a long quilted gray vest that had been worked in blue and silver thread. The cloth would keep Maruman’s claws from digging too deep. When I invited him to come with me, he stretched and yawned, showing his teeth, before climbing lightly over onto my shoulders. I padded barefoot out onto the deck and stopped to make sure Rushton was not in sight; then I made my way swiftly toward the front of the ship. I wanted to find Brydda or Jakoby so I could seek their advice about Rushton, but the enticing scent of cooking led me to the galley, where a large, powerfully built woman swooped on Maruman, saying she had been saving something special for him. To my amused disgust, Maruman shamelessly endured her crooning and petting for the tidbits she offered.
“Food is being served in the saloon,” the cook said when I asked if she had something for me. Guessing she must mean the main chamber where I had eaten earlier, I thanked her, not wanting to explain why I did not want to go there. Maruman languidly bade me go, saying he would seek me out later. I decided to see if I could find out where Brydda’s cabin was, but before I had taken two steps, Gilbert stepped out of the gathering shadows of dusk.
“I thought you looked beautiful as a gypsy, but you look truly ravishing in Sadorian clothes,” he said. “I was just coming to escort you to the saloon for the meeting.”
“I am perfectly capable of finding my own way from one end of the deck to the other,” I snapped, and marched past him, wondering how to get rid of him. Moments later, I ran into Gwynedd.
“Can it be Elspeth Gordie?” he asked, squinting down at me, for despite my height, he was taller by far.
“It is good to see you, Chieftain Gwynedd,” I said. “I wanted to say how well you spoke in the meeting yesterday.”
“You were there? But, yes, Merret mentioned that you sat a while in the gallery with Blyss. Come into the saloon. We should have a little while before everyone is assembled.”
Seeing no way to avoid it, I allowed him to take my arm, hoping I could slip away without encountering Rushton. A number of lanterns now swung from hooks on the beams, shedding an inconstant, honeyed light over the saloon, which was empty but for Dardelan and Rushton. Both looked up at our arrival, and there was no time to withdraw, even if I could have come up with a reason to do so, for Dardelan lifted his hand in greeting.
Gwynedd firmly steered me across the room to the seat alongside Rushton’s, and I forced myself to look at him and nod a greeting. I expected coolness in response, but his expression was icy. Before I could utter a word, Rushton stood up abruptly, saying that he would go and waken Brydda. He assayed a jerky, general bow and departed.
I felt the blood burn in my cheeks, but to my relief, after an awkward pause, Gwynedd only said, “I wonder if you would tell me some more about your time on Herder Isle. Merret told me what she knew, but I feel sure there was much more to be told. In particular, I am interested in these shadows that serve the Faction. You see, the goddesses worshipped by the Norse forbade slavery as unspeakably base. Am I correct in thinking the slaves were all taken from the Westland?”
I nodded, striving to control my roiling emotions and desperate to leave the saloon before Rushton returned. It was bad enough that Dardelan had seen how he snubbed me, but what if he treated me badly in front of the others? It would be painful and humiliating, but I was more afraid that someone might upbraid him for it and precipitate what I most feared.
Gwynedd was still looking at me expectantly, so I took a steadying breath and told Gwynedd of the shadows, and he said
that he would offer homes in Murmroth to any who wished to return to the Westland. He would also see that they had work or were given funds that would allow them to establish a trade or business for themselves, if they wished it.
“You are kind. I am sure many will be glad to take up your offer,” I said, unable to keep from stealing glances at the doors each time they swung open. So far, a number of Gwynedd’s men had entered, and now another group entered with Brydda. He came to join us while they took a table near the door and began a noisy game of dice.
As Brydda dropped into the seat beside him, Dardelan asked if he had seen Rushton. “He went looking for you,” he added.
“I saw him, but I did not need waking,” Brydda said, reaching for a jug of fement and pouring himself a mug. “He has gone to fetch our good shipmistress, but he says to begin the discussion without him. I fear he is in a black mood.”
I felt Dardelan and Gwynedd look at me, and the sympathy in their eyes made my eyes prick with tears. I blinked hard to stem the flow, but to my mortification, two slid down my cheeks. I brushed them away and would have risen save that Brydda very deliberately pushed an empty mug across to me and poured into it a dram of ruby red fement, bidding me firmly to drink. Then he filled his own mug and tapped mine with it gently, saying, “To courage in the great dice game that is life.”
Dardelan reached out to lay a hand over mine, saying softly, “He is not himself, Elspeth.”
I drank a mouthful of the fement and tried to smile, but a storm of tears was rising behind my eyes, and I knew suddenly that there was no holding them back. I stood up abruptly, and immediately Brydda rose, too. Taking my hand, he murmured to the others that he needed some fresh air before the meeting began. I was unable to speak and was half-blinded by tears as he led me deftly into the cold night. He brought me to the side of the ship and laid his big hand on my shoulder.
I shook my head and stepped away from him. “Please, don’t,” I whispered, my voice quaking. “If you are kind, I will never get control of myself.” He nodded and stood silent while I gulped and blinked and sniffed my way to some sort of calmness. “I am sorry,” I told the big rebel hoarsely at last. “It is only that I have been so worried.”
“Rushton has been behaving badly,” Brydda said, and there was anger in his voice. “Whatever happened to him in the cloister in Sutrium is not your fault. Why take it out on you, of all people?”
“Oh, Brydda, if only you knew,” I said, drawing a long steadying breath. “You must not blame Rushton for the way he is behaving, especially toward me. When we spoke in Rangorn, I told you that his imprisonment in the cloister in Sutrium had broken something in him and that he would not permit me to enter his blocked memories to help him. I did not tell you that Rushton told me that he could no longer love me.”
Brydda looked at me in frank disbelief. “He did not mean it, surely.”
“I did not believe it either, but when I saw him in Saithwold, he was even more cold and harsh toward me. I saw then that he had meant what he said at Obernewtyn. Dameon said I was wrong and that it was because he loved me that Rushton was so cold. He said it was because I stirred him deeply that he rejected me, because if he allowed himself to feel anything for me, it would force him to face the memories of what had happened to him.” I swallowed hard. “But Dameon did not know what I now know. What Domick told me …”
Brydda’s eyes widened. “Domick? But how …?” He stopped, comprehension flooding his expression. “They were taken at the same time, weren’t they?”
I nodded. “Apparently, Rushton had found Domick and was trying to convince him to return to Obernewtyn when they were taken. Ariel had foreseen the meeting. But they were not separated, as it might seem, Domick was not taken to Herder Isle and Rushton to the cloister in Sutrium. They were both brought aboard the Black Ship and taken to Norseland.”
“Norseland! But Rushton was found in the Sutrium cloister!” Brydda said.
I told him what the Threes had said about Rushton and Ariel, and then I told him all that Domick had said. The rebel shook his head, and a look of revulsion crossed his rough, kind face. “I cannot believe that Domick was made to torture Rushton.… No wonder his mind split in two.”
“What happened to him was our fault. We sent him to spy, and it was what he did as a spy that created Mika, and it was Mika whom Ariel found and used,” I said, fresh tears welling in my eyes. “But in telling me about Rushton, Domick broke free from Ariel’s control. Apparently, he was not meant to be able to speak at all. Mika was supposed to be in control.”
“That tells us that Ariel makes mistakes. And he has made a mistake in thinking that he has broken Rushton. The question now is what to do,” Brydda said.
I told him of my conversation with Dell about Rushton and how I was to ask Blyss to help me prepare him to remember. “Only I never got the chance to speak to Blyss about it, and now …”
“Rushton is aboard the Umborine with you,” Brydda concluded.
“With me but without Blyss or any empath or healer,” I reminded him. “And worse, we are bound for Norseland, where Ariel tortured him. Rushton is likely to remember what happened if he goes ashore, especially if he sees the place where Ariel took him.”
“Ye gods,” Brydda said. “Then he must not go ashore.”
“That would be the best thing, but how can we stop him without telling him why he must stay aboard the Umborine?”
Brydda tugged at his beard absently, glaring unseeingly at the dark sea. Then he looked at me. “Gwynedd wants Jakoby to lower three small ship boats before the Umborine enters the shoal passage, which is the only way into the main cove of the island. The Herders simply call it Main Cove, but Gwynedd says the Norselanders used to call it Fryddcove after one of their goddesses. He means to be aboard one of the ship boats with as many of his people as safely possible in order to seek out a hidden inlet leading to a tiny cove his mother told him about called Uttecove. It will not be easy, for the inlet is perilously narrow and must be entered in the right way, but once the ship boats are in the cove, there is a way up to the island’s surface. I do not know why Gwynedd is so certain that the Faction has not learned of this secret way, but he is prepared to risk his life and the lives of others on his certainty. Once on the surface, he means to rouse the Norselanders who live there to fight the Hedra. Rushton means to go with him, but what if Gwynedd asks you to come with him, claiming that he needs your Talents? Given what I have seen, that is likely to stop Rushton from going.”
I nodded bleakly. “It will, but what is the Umborine to do?”
“Gwynedd’s idea is that we enter Fryddcove and make a lot of fuss, demanding this and that and posturing and making threats to draw the Faction’s attention. That will leave Gwynedd free to act behind their backs. It will also prevent Rushton from going ashore at once.”
“What if Beforetime weapons are used against you?”
“That is a possibility,” Brydda admitted. “However, since this is a Sadorian ship, I do not think anything will be done in haste, for the Hedra have no open quarrel with the desert lands. In any case, Rushton suggested that Jakoby demand to speak with Ariel. That way we can learn if he remained upon the island after Salamander left.”
“All right, so Gwynedd will go ashore, but what does he imagine he will do then? He cannot win against the Hedra in the few days he will have before Jakoby must take Rushton to Templeport.”
“Gwynedd’s primary purpose is to make sure there are no weapons or stores of plague seeds on Norseland that the Faction can use. He thinks that much can be accomplished in a twoday with the help of the Norselanders who live there, hence his determination to make contact.”
“Do you know what Rushton is going to ask the tribes?” I said slowly.
Brydda’s eyes widened. “Ye gods! You cannot know. Yesterday, just before we left the meeting house in Aborium, Zarak rode in. Dameon had sent him across the river with instructions to find Rushton. As soon as Zarak crossed, Linnet
summoned a horse and sent him riding for Aborium.”
My heart was beating fast. “What has happened?”
“Maryon came to Sutrium with a futuretelling that the slavemasters who hold the Red Queen’s land are planning to invade the Land. If they come, Maryon says, they will bring such a horde that the Land on both sides of the Suggredoon, the Norselands, and the Sadorian desert lands will all fall to them, and any who do not die fighting will be enslaved.”
I stared at him, aghast. “Maryon says they will fall? There is no hope?”
“There is no hope if they come, she says. There is some slight hope if they are prevented from coming.”
“You talk in riddles, or Maryon does,” I snapped.
“Maryon says a force must be mustered and carried by four greatships to the Red Queen’s land before the Days of Rain.”
“We do not have four …” I stopped, and understanding swept over me. “Rushton will ask the Sadorians for use of their two remaining spicewood greatships!”
Brydda nodded. “Two Sadorian ships, plus the Stormdancer and the ship that Dardelan has had built these two months, and we will just manage the four, though the Stormdancer will need repairs and Dardelan’s ship must be completed. And all the ships will have to be especially fitted for such a journey.”
“What said Shipmaster Helvar about this?” I asked.
“He said he must consult with the ship’s proper master. Indeed, the Stormdancer left for Herder Isle even as Zarak set off. But the lad says the Norselanders were ferocious at the mere idea of losing a freedom so recently won.”
“I cannot see the tribes refusing their ships, given their hatred of slavery and the fact that their own land will be in danger, too,” I said.
“Jakoby says as much, but even so, the request must be made to the tribes, and if it is not made when they are together, someone must ride to each of the tribes to ask if they would agree to holding another conclave. This would be a task of many sevendays, perhaps even months. Maryon must have seen as much, or why urge Dameon to send someone after Rushton at all speed?”