* * * * *
Leisu had walked down all of the streets and through most of the narrow alleys between buildings at least once before he finally found Grandon on a small rise at the edge of town, staring out at a small pool of water that probably served as the only freshwater source for the town. Grandon looked over his shoulder at Leisu’s arrival but then turned his attention back to the water when he saw him.
“Like I said earlier, I’m quite surprised Weiling is as small as it is,” Grandon said as much to himself as to Leisu.
Leisu walked right up to Grandon and put his hand on the back of his arm. This gesture caught the man’s attention quickly, and he turned to scowl at Leisu. Before he could say anything, however, Leisu was already pulling him back toward the town.
“We have to go now!” Leisu told him as he turned the Adjurian back toward the town. “A ship full of Adjurians has just arrived.”
Grandon stopped suddenly and Leisu was forced to turn around and look at him.
“A ship full of Adjurians?” Grandon asked, confusion showing plainly on his face. “Why?”
“It would seem that they’re here to see the imperial representative about trade issues,” Leisu replied, taking Grandon’s arm once again and pulling him back toward the street.
Grandon shrugged off Leisu’s grasp and began moving quickly toward the docks on his own. “Well, that is something. We were just speaking of that this morning.”
“The important thing is to get you back aboard the ship as soon as possible.”
“Oh, don’t be so worried,” Grandon said, showing Leisu a slight smile. “I’m sure these men are harmless. Besides, the last thing they’ll think to see is their False King walking the streets of Weiling.”
Grandon chuckled, but kept up his quick pace. Even though he gave the appearance of aloofness, Leisu saw that the news had shaken him. Pictures of the man had been seen in Jonguria when he’d had his brief reign; no doubt they would have been much more widely known in Adjuria during that time. The men that he’d seen enter the office were of the right age to have fought in the East-West War, Leisu knew, and they would no doubt recognize Grandon on sight.
Leisu steered them through the back alleys and to the main street. He was relieved to see that the three dockworkers were still standing on the office porch; the Adjurians were still in their meeting. He allowed himself a small smile at their good fortune and motioned for Grandon to step out into the main street and toward the staircase. They were passing directly in front of the office when the small boy that had accompanied the older Adjurians suddenly stepped out onto the porch. The boy’s gaze immediately fell upon Grandon, and he froze in the middle of the street when he saw him. Leisu could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, and he reached his hand down to the pommel of his sword as he assessed the situation. The boy stared right at Grandon for a moment and then his brows rose up as if a sudden realization had come upon him. He stared for a moment longer then turned quickly and went back into the office.
Leisu pushed Grandon forward and down the street. “He saw me,” was all the Adjurian could manage as he walked the last few feet to the staircase. Grandon was silent the rest of the way to the ship, but once they were safely aboard he turned to Leisu.
“The boy saw me!” he said, his voice anxious and forced. “Did you see his eyes? He knew who I was. How a boy that age could know I have no idea, but I’m telling you, he knew!”
“Are you sure?” Leisu asked. “He is just a boy after all. It could just be that he was surprised to see another Adjurian is all.”
“No,” Grandon said, shaking his head, “I could see it in the way his brows shot up and his eyes grew larger. He knew that he was staring straight at the worst villain in Adjurian history from the past fifty years.”
Leisu lowered his head in thought for a moment then looked up at Grandon. “I’ll take care of it,” he said, then walked back toward the gangplank. He told one of the crewmen that no matter their state of readiness, they must get out of this harbor before the Adjurian ship sailed. He turned back to Grandon. “It would be best if you now took my advice and retired to the captain’s cabin.”
For once Grandon listened. With a nod he turned and headed to the cabin at the rear of the ship and went in. If only he would have done that earlier, Leisu thought with some disgust. This Adjurian was becoming more trouble than he was worth, he thought as he headed down onto the pier. He flagged down a passing dockworker.
“Do you report to the imperial representative…”
“Yuan Jibao,” the man finished for Leisu.
“Yes. Tell Yuan that the Adjurians are not to make it back to Adjuria.”
The man looked at him for a moment, then slowly nodded his head and headed toward the staircase. Leisu didn’t like to have to take that route. A ship full of Adjurian government trade delegates gone missing wasn’t good. It would raise unwanted questions. Inquiries would be made. This man Yuan would be questioned. It would come out that a large Jongurian ship, not built or equipped for fishing, had sailed in from the south just before their arrival. The fact that one of Zhou’s lieutenants was aboard it would be reported. This could only end badly. But what was the alternative? Let the Adjurians return to their country with news that they spotted Grandon Fray in Weiling? Leisu thought about it for a moment. The idea was farfetched. And it would come from the mouth of a boy. What harm could there possibly be in that? Who’d believe that he’d done anything more than read one too many histories and had his nerves rattled in a foreign port? Leisu decided that killing the Adjurians would create more problems than the overactive imagination of a young boy. He began to move toward the staircase to follow the man he’d just spoken to when Ko’s voice came calling down to him from the ship.
“We’re ready to depart, sir.”
Leisu stopped and looked toward the staircase. He warred with his thoughts for a moment before a dockworker came scurrying past him from behind.
“You there,” he called out. The man stopped and meekly walked back to stand before him. “The man I just spoke to, do you know him?”
The man nodded without looking up so Leisu continued.
“Tell him to forget about what I just told him,” he said, then turned and headed back toward the ship.
The lines were being untied and the sails unfurled when he got back on the deck. The gangplank was pulled back to the pier and they cast off. Leisu stood on the railing and stared back at the receding town of Weiling and the Adjurian ship that’d had such bad timing. No matter, he thought to himself, in little more than a day they’d be in Bindao and all their troubles would be over.
FOURTEEN
Halam led the group away from the trade office and back toward the wooden staircase and pier. The large ship that was tied up next to theirs when they’d entered the bay was just then leaving, turning back into the sea. They walked down the stairs and were soon back on their own ship, which was busy with activity. The crewmen were busy scrubbing down the ship’s deck when they returned and Edgyn stopped to have a few words with Sam while the others headed into the cabin. Bryn decided that since none of the others wanted to hear what he had to say he’d climb up into the rigging for a better look at Weiling, perhaps catching another glimpse of the Adjurian he was sure had been the False King.
Bryn was able to see nearly the whole island when he got up to the crosstrees on the mainmast, including the tip of the island to the west, the waves making the black rocks white as they crashed over them. The site of Weiling was well chosen. The island tapered off creating a natural bay here, the high cliffs forming a bowl to keep the ocean waves out. Past the small bay and harbor were more wooden buildings set on the rocky shores. The city itself wasn’t much and couldn’t rightly be called a city at all, Bryn thought, and he decided that he’d call it a town from now on. The main street that the buildings crowded around tapered off after just a few hundred feet and the buildings with it. There wasn’t any vegetation to be see
n at all, and only a small pool of water set further behind some of the buildings, whether fresh or saltwater he couldn’t tell. He looked down at the imperial office building they’d just left and wondered what they’d do. Everyone had expected the Jongurians to eagerly jump at the opportunity to trade again. At least that was the opinion at the trade conference in Baden, and they’d shared the assumption all way to Jonguria. It was a rather hard slap in the face to have their assumptions shattered this morning by the imperial representative. It just made no sense to Bryn for the man to act that way. Surely someone else would come forward, pardoning his colleague’s rude behavior and urging them to sail back as fast as they could, and with many ships full of goods for the Jongurian markets.
Bryn put away the spyglass. There was no sign of the man he’d seen. He looked over to where the small bay turned back into the sea. The large ship that’d left when they came back to the docks was moving steadily away from the island and heading west. The tall masts already had all sails unfurled. Could the man he saw, Grandon he was sure, be on that ship, perhaps heading back to Adjuria in another attempt to seize the throne?
What would Grandon Fray be doing here anyway? Bryn wondered as he looked at the ship grow smaller in the distance. He knew that the man had been exiled to Desolatia Island following the Civil War more than five years ago. Could he have been mistaken? No, there was no way. He’d looked right into the man’s eyes, and that had startled the man, Bryn could tell. It was as if the man had known that Bryn knew who he was, and didn’t know what to do about it. If the last thing that Bryn expected to see was another Adjurian walking the streets of Weiling, then surely this man did as well, he thought. He had to tell somebody about what he saw. Slowly he climbed down from the rigging, still a bit flustered at the man’s appearance.
The crewmen were still going about their work on the ship when Bryn came down from the rigging, so he decided to enter the cabin and see how the discussions were going between the men. He stepped through the door to see Pader talking and pacing while the others sat and listened.
“It’s obvious that this Yuan Jibao doesn’t like Adjuria,” he was saying. “I don’t see any way that we’re going to get anywhere with him.”
“What makes you think there’s someone else here to talk to?” Millen asked from one of the bunks.
“If this man Yuan says he’s the imperial representative,” Edgyn said quickly before Pader had a chance to respond, “then he’s the man we want to talk to. In the past it’s always been as such!”
“Surely there’s another representative here,” Iago added.
Edgyn stroked his goatee. “In the past, yes, there were often a few of them here at any given time. But that was when several ships were coming in each week, sometimes each day. Now with trade having been suspended for so long, we should consider ourselves lucky to’ve found one here at all.”
“Yes, we were very ‘lucky’ to have this man speak to us so kindly,” Pader said sarcastically.
“Perhaps we could go to the mainland and find a more willing audience,” Halam offered after a few silent moments passed.
Edgyn shook his head. “Out of the question. Even when we traded in the past it was very clear that ships could only land on Nanbo Island. The Jongurians were very explicit that Adjurians were to remain out of their country. I doubt very much that anything’s changed.”
“So we just sit here and hope that this Yuan has a change of heart about the matter, is that it?” Pader asked.
“I don’t see what else we can do,” Edgyn admitted.
“If we hear nothing by tomorrow, then I suggest that we all go back and talk with him again,” Willem said from the table. “If his mindset’s remained the same, we head home.”
“Aye, it would appear that those’re our only options,” Halam said.
The men seemed to sink down into their chairs in frustration and defeat, the prospect of sailing home empty-handed weighing on them heavily. They’d done so much to wrangle a trade deal out of the conference the week before, and that was expected to be the more difficult task. Talking to the Jongurians would be easy, everyone thought. That was quickly turning out not to be the case, and the men were at a loss as to what to do next.
A knock at the door broke them out of their brooding, and Sam walked into the cabin.
“Captain,” he said, “the Jongurian men are at the ship requesting an audience.”
They all looked at one another with eyes fast filling with hope, their frowns turning to smiles.
“Well, that didn’t take long at all,” Rodden said.
“I told you,” Millen said, “memories of the war probably came flooding back to him when he saw us and his temper took hold. We’ll be discussing how many ships to send now that he’s had a chance to cool-off.”
They headed out onto the deck. Two Jongurian men different from the three that’d escorted them to the office stood at the ship’s railing. They stood taller as they saw Edgyn approach.
“Can we have another chance to talk with Yuan?” Edgyn asked them.
One of the men stepped forward and spoke a few sentences in Jongurian. Edgyn and Pader looked at one another and then back at the man. Edgyn said a few quick sentences back to the man, but he shook his head to whatever was asked of him.
“What are they saying?” Iago asked.
“They say that we’re to leave Weiling now and sail back to Adjuria,” Pader replied.
“What!” Rodden exclaimed. “Can’t you tell them we want another talk?”
Edgyn turned to look at them. “I’ve asked that, but he’s adamant that there’re to be no Adjurians in the country, and that we leave now.”
“But I saw an Adjurian in the middle of the street while you were in the office arguing about Yuan,” Bryn said quickly.
The Jongurian man that had spoken turned to look at him and stared for a few moments before repeating Bryn’s words to Edgyn.
“Wait,” Edgyn said turning to Bryn and holding up his hand to the stop the Jongurian, “what do you mean you saw and Adjurian?”
“After we were told to leave by Yuan I went out onto the porch” Bryn explained. “Walking in the middle of the street were a Jongurian and an Adjurian. He had a goatee like yours, but grey instead of black, and he was taller than the Jongurian man that walked behind him.”
The Jongurian said a few sentences to Pader.
“He says that we’re the only Adjurians on the island and that it’s time for us to go,” Pader translated.
“So he can understand us, then?” Iago said. He turned to the Jongurian. “Tell Yuan that we want to have another talk!”
“You must have been mistaken, Bryn. Maybe the beard threw you off. Some Jongurians can grow quite a bit of facial hair,” Edgyn said, ignoring Iago.
“No, I saw clearly. He had eyes like ours, not slanted downward at the corners like the Jongurians.” Bryn paused for a minute. He decided that now was as good a time as any. “It was Grandon Fray, I’m sure of it.”
“Grandon Fray, you say? The False King?” Pader said urgently, turning his attention back to Bryn.
“I’m sure of it” Bryn immediately responded.
The men looked from one another before the Jongurian spoke to them again, this time in Adjurian.
“It is time for you to go,” he said in a thick accent. “No Adjurians here. Only you. You need to go now.” A few other Jongurians had appeared behind the men as the conversation carried on, some with large fishing knives at their belts.
“Alright, we heard you,” Edgyn said, turning his attention back to the man. “We’ll leave.”
“But we haven’t had a chance to talk with Yuan again,” Pader protested.
“And we won’t be getting that chance,” Edgyn said. “It’s clear that they want us gone, and I mean to do as they say before any trouble arises.” He turned to Sam who still stood behind them. “Prepare the ship to sail.”
“Yes captain,” Sam said as he hurried away to tel
l the other crewmen.
“We can’t just go without another audience!” Pader said to Edgyn. “I mean to have another talk with that man before we leave this island.” He shoved past the two Jongurians blocking the gangplank and stepped down onto the pier. Two of the Jongurians that’d gathered around the ship drew the knives at their belts and held them up threateningly toward Pader.
“You go,” one of them said in Adjurian.
“I just want to talk with Yuan Jibao!” Pader said to them, repeating the words in Jongurian.
The other Jongurian flicked his knife with his wrist, gesturing for Pader to get back on the ship.
“Pader, get on the ship!” Edgyn yelled.
As if seeing the knives for the first time, Pader slowly walked backward to the gangplank and got back on the ship. The two Jongurians sheathed their knives while the other two on the ship returned to the pier.
“You go!” the man said again as he stood on the pier.
“Yes, we know. We’re going,” Rodden said to him. They seemed satisfied and walked back further down the pier, although they stood by the staircase and watched them.
Edgyn turned back to Bryn. “Perhaps you did see an Adjurian, Bryn, but it appears we’ll not be given the chance to find out.” He turned and walked back toward the steering wheel.
“Well, that was a short trip,” Iago said angrily.
“Aye, really a waste of time, it would seem,” Halam agreed. They headed back toward the cabin, Millen and Rodden following close behind. Pader seemed to just be realizing that only moments ago he’d had two large knives in his face, and looked to be shocked. He silently went back to the cabin as well. Willem stayed near the gangplank with Bryn.
“He looked like Grandon, eh? That is very interesting,” he said after a few moments, still looking at the Jongurians on the pier.
“I’m certain that is was an Adjurian,” Bryn repeated. “I wondered what he’d be doing here, and thought that maybe he was a lost fisherman, or a victim of a shipwreck.”
“No Adjurian ships would be sailing these waters,” Willem said. He turned to look at Bryn. “How can you be so sure it was Grandon? You’ve never seen the man.”
“I’ve seen his picture in books before” Bryn said.
Willem looked at him skeptically. “Books, eh?”
“I’m telling you Willem, it was him. His eyes rose up when I saw him, and…well, I just know,” Bryn said, frustrated that no one would believe him, or even seemed interested.
Willem scratched at his chin. “The Jongurians have a hostile attitude toward us and want us to leave, but then secretly they are sheltering an Adjurian? I find that very interesting, don’t you?”
“It does seem a bit strange,” Bryn admitted.
“Yes it does,” Willem agreed. “Who could this mystery man be, and what is his purpose here? Why are the Jongurians so insistent that we leave with no discussion of trade having taken place? Who benefits from this?”
“I don’t understand,” Bryn said after a moment.
“Let’s suppose for a moment that you really did see Grandon Fray in Weiling,” Pader said. “That could do a great deal to explain why the Jongurians are so eager to be rid of us.”
“So you think it may have been him?” Bryn asked?
Willem folded his arms and leaned onto the ship’s railing. He stared up at the small buildings above the wooden staircase and a few moments passed before he spoke.
“I’ve underestimated you before, Bryn,” Willem said with a smile as he rose to head back to the others in the cabin, “and I don’t mean to now. I have a feeling that the False King may have just reared his traitorous head in Weiling.”
FIFTEEN
They weighed anchor and headed out of the harbor less than an hour after the Jongurians told them to leave. It was already late in the day and in only a few hours the sun would be setting behind them. To the west thick black clouds could be seen forming.
“It appears that our week of fine weather is coming to an end,” Edgyn said from his place at the wheel, pointing at the sky ahead of them. “We’ll be having us a storm tonight.”
They had no problem moving out of the harbor and were soon making their way back along the island the way they’d come earlier. It was disappointing to leave with nothing to show for their week at sea, but nothing could be done for it now. Bryn’s thoughts settled back onto what Willem had said. Could it really be possible that Grandon Fray was the man that he saw emerge from the trade office back in Weiling? There must be some mistake, he thought; everyone knew that Fray had been exiled to Desolatia Island following the Civil War. He’d been the main cause of it, all had agreed. During his brief reign the country experienced a rapid decline in its fortunes, which could be directly attributed to his harsh tax and trade policies. The provinces began to blame their problems on one another, and this was one of the contributing factors which led to the Civil War. If Grandon Fray was loose from his rocky exile and now living in Jonguria, Bryn was certain that something bad was about to happen.
But there was really nothing that he could do about it. The only one who’d shown any interest in Bryn’s sighting, besides the Jongurians, was Willem. His uncle and the other men were skulking in the cabin, feeling depressed about how the events of the day had turned out. They weren’t in the mood to hear anymore about it.
Rain began to pelt the sails by the time they reached the pointed edge of Nanbo Island and Sam brought out thick leather raincoats for the crew to wear. The dark clouds had become larger by that point, and when they cleared the island the wind increased, throwing up great walls of spray from the waves crashing against the ship’s hull. Edgyn called for the topmasts and the mainmast to be taken down, and the crewmen quickly climbed up the rigging to lash them securely to the mast and crosstrees. Only the foremast remained to propel them onward, but with the wind as fierce as it was, they still pushed on at a good speed. Bryn considered going into the cabin to stay dry, but the prospect of missing out on the only storm at sea he’d have a chance to witness firsthand kept him on the deck. He walked over to stand by Edgyn and Sam at the wheel.
“Best put this on lad if you mean to stay out here,” Sam said, handing Bryn one of the raincoats.
Bryn quickly pulled it on, glad to be out of what was fast becoming a heavy downpour. The ocean around them was covered in tiny dots as thousands of rain droplets fell upon it. The sun had disappeared, whether over the horizon or behind the clouds Bryn couldn’t tell.
“How long will this last?” Bryn asked Sam.
“Hard to say,” Sam yelled over the sound of wind and rain. “Could last all night and into tomorrow, or blow itself out in a few hours.”
“Would be best to head into the cabin and have something to eat before the seas get too rough,” Edgyn shouted to him.
Bryn decided that wasn’t a bad idea and started to head across the deck and down the small stairs. He had to hang on tightly to the railing as the ship swayed in the wind. The deck was slick with rain so Bryn slid more than stepped his way to the cabin door. The winds were so stiff that he had to put all of his weight into pulling the door open.
Inside Halam, Pader, Iago, and Willem were crowded around the table eating bread and cheese. Rodden and Millen were both lying down on the bunks, Millen moaning loudly and holding a small wooden bucket over his stomach while Rodden had his arm over his eyes. Bryn did his best to walk over to the table, but it came out as more of a stagger as the ship rocked in the rough seas.
“How is it out there?” his uncle asked when Bryn made it to the table, his wet raincoat dripping puddles onto the floor around him.
“Sam says the storm could last all night and into tomorrow, or for just a few hours. He’s not sure,” Bryn replied, repeating the crewman’s words. Millen moaned louder at that, while Willem and Pader smiled to each other across the table.
“Well, all we can do is sit tight and ride it out, I suppose,” Iago said between bites of bread.
Th
ere wasn’t much talk around the table after that, so Bryn ate his bread and cheese silently, hoping that the combination of the food in his stomach and the stormy sea didn’t send him to his bunk, as was the case with Millen and Rodden. The other men finished eating and then stared off at the cabin walls, every once in a while looking up as a particularly large wave seemed to crash into the ship or a peal of thunder sounded outside. Once he was dry, Bryn decided that he was bored enough to get wet all over again, so he shakily headed back out the door.
The wind howled and he thought the door would blow away when he opened it, but he managed to hold on to it and shut it firmly before carefully walking back to the stairs with his arms outstretched to keep his balance. Sam had the wheel now while Edgyn intently looked through a spyglass at the sea behind them, taking it from his eye as he noticed Bryn approach.
“We’ve got company,” he said, pointing out at the dark sea over the stern.
Bryn squinted and put his arm up to his forehead to keep the blowing rain out of his face, but he couldn’t make out anything. Just then a flash of lighting illuminated the world around them and he caught sight of two large sails several leagues to their rear. He quickly jerked his gaze up to Edgyn after seeing them.
“Two ships, a bit larger than us,” Edgyn answered his worried look. “Fess caught sight of ‘em when he was securing the sails high up on the mainmast. I figure they’ve been following us since we left Weiling, but took advantage of the storm’s low visibility to gain on us. They haven’t lowered their mainsails yet.”
“What does that mean?” Bryn asked, unsure exactly what Edgyn was getting at.
Edgyn looked from Sam to Bryn, then put the glass to his eye and turned his attention back to the ships. “It means they’ll try to overtake us.”
Bryn looked up to Sam. “You mean catch us and stop us?”
“Aye, it would appear so,” Sam replied, his fists clenched tightly to the wheel.
“But why would the Jongurians want to catch us if they just sent us away?” Bryn asked.
“I don’t think they mean to apologize for kicking us out of their country, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Edgyn replied with a laugh.
“So they want to hurt us then?”
“It would seem that way, yes.” Edgyn said seriously, putting the glass back in his pocket and looking down at Bryn. “I’ve no real idea as to their intentions, lad, but I’ve had Jongurian ships on my tail before and can tell the difference between the good-intentioned and the bad. These look bad to me.” He looked out over the ship. “I don’t think we have a chance to outrun them in this storm.”
“So what will happen then?” Bryn asked, and Sam also looked to Edgyn for an answer.
Edgyn looked up at the rigging for a few moments more before turning his eyes to Sam then Bryn. “Best go and inform the others as to the situation, Bryn,” he replied, pulling the glass from his pocket to stare behind him once again, “this could get rough.”