Cold Fire

36

Into the sea.

The warm salty water closed over my face, but I did not have the luxury of panic. I pulled to the surface and breached just as I realized two sharks were circling, drawn by the scent of my blood. My rage and hate leaked like poison into the water, and perhaps that was why they did not dart in for the kill. Or perhaps because they recognized a kinswoman. For they stayed away, merely keeping an eye on me as I floundered toward shore.

It seemed inevitable that I waded to shore at the jetty almost exactly where Drake had dumped me the first time. The few men working the piers turned to watch me emerge from the sea with my blouse and pagne plastered to my body, revealing every curve and mound. My blood streaked one leg. When I glared at them, they backed away.

I halted on the revetment next to baskets filled with fresh catch, slippery pargo with their red tails and little cachicata. Behind, the sun had risen two hands above the horizon, the dawn feed done and the wind no more than a soft breeze. The wide flat expanse of the waters in their constant shimmering reminded me of the trolls’ mirrors. At least I had saved Bee.

The sky shone so blue it looked flat; wisps of cloud trailed off the highlands. I scanned the roofs and smoke of the city but saw no sign of the Taino airship fleet. Indeed, there weren’t many men on the piers. The streets had a peculiar emptiness, as if most traffic had drained off in the face of a coming storm. The few men gathered into clumps to whisper and stare as I dripped across the boulevard and walked into the deserted carpentry yard. Only three people worked there, despite the early-morning coolness. The two men set down their axes and hurried under the shade of the shelter’s roof, where the Taino boss was leaning over her table making tallies in her accounts book. She looked up, saw me, and said something in Taino to them. They bolted out the back as she straightened to greet me.

“The maku’s perdita,” she said in the local speech.

“Could you ask me a question, please?” I said.

She had the Taino habit of looking at you directly and without fear. “What manner of question shall I ask, Perdita?”

The thrill that coursed through my heart made me smile, not with joy but with resolve. “That was the right one. What day is it? What happened to the Taino fleet?”

“In the Roman calendar, ’tis the third day of November. As for the other, here is the story as I heard it. Three nights back, when the cursed Council surrendered Expedition to the Taino cacica, a witch flew down out of the night, turned she own self into a big black saber-toothed cat and killed the cacica, then tore her to bits and threw she head in a well. That witch was surely angry because the cacica had stolen the maku fire bane the witch loved. Yee suppose that could be true?”

“No, not quite like that. But what happened afterward?”

“The witch flew off with the maku.”

“I mean, what has happened in Expedition?”

“Why, the wardens took control of Council House. Yesterday Gaius Sanogo was elected by unanimous vote as president of the committee that shall sit to write a charter for an Assembly. An Assembly we shall now have. ’Tis long past time, if yee want me opinion on it. As for the Taino, they cannot trouble us until they sort out they own rule. If Prince Caonabo wish to inherit he uncle’s duho, he and all that army must return to Sharagua.”

“You’re Taino.”

“No, gal. I’s an Expeditioner, born and raised. Some say yee killed the maku. Did yee so? Or only fly off with him?”

I raised my eyes to the heavens, so bold and vast and fathomless, like the face of the ice. “I never had wings. I was only the arrow my sire loosed to find his mark. And so the hunt drank the cacica’s blood, and then its master stole my beloved to keep me on his leash.”

I shut my eyes. In the spirit world, the length of a kiss might stretch to three days. I pressed a hand over my locket and felt the pulse of the chain that bound us. The only thing that could break it now was death, and Vai still lived.

I opened my eyes to surprise the Taino woman with a look of wry pity on her weathered face. “Shall yee like somewhat to eat or drink? Juice, or rum? Guava, perhaps?”

“I am not an opia, although I do like guava. I’m not a witch, either. But I would take a shot of rum and a cup of juice, with thanks.”

The rum was potent enough to steady me, and the juice soothed my aching throat. The boss offered me more juice, which I drank.

“Cat?” I looked up to see Luce, chest heaving as she ran up. “Cat!” She hugged me so hard it squeezed the air from my lungs.

Aunty Djeneba proceeded with less haste and more dignity toward us, accompanied by one of the men who had fled the carpentry yard. She spoke briefly with the Taino boss. Her mouth creased down as she turned to me. “Well, Cat, yee have turned up again.”

“Like a three-days-dead fish,” sniveled Luce, releasing me to wipe her eyes.

I couldn’t speak. I knew I was about to start bawling.

“I can see yee need to clean up and get fresh clothes,” said Aunty. “Luce, yee run and fetch Kayleigh. Cat, yee shall come home with us until Kofi-lad can come from the meeting down at Council House. He have spoken to us about those things which happened. I hope yee shall forgive me harsh words to yee.”

Heart full and throat choked, I whispered, “Yes.”

Then I bawled anyway on the way to the boardinghouse. A shower revived me. Clean clothes made me feel almost human. A platter of Aunty’s rice and peas and a slab of fried pargo with several more cups of guava juice sweetened with lime and pineapple restored my will, as if such humble gestures were magic. Because they were.

I was considering a second platter of rice and peas when Kofi and Gaius Sanogo arrived.

“Were you working for him all along?” I demanded of Kofi as he and the commissioner sat opposite me. “Are you secretly a warden?”

“I’s standing for the Assembly, when it come time for the vote,” said Kofi. “As for the other, I’s sure me own tale is no stranger than the one I hope yee mean to tell us now.”

“There is a lot of it you won’t believe.”

“That would be a change,” teased Kofi with a laugh that coaxed a smile from me.

“I’s willing to pass me own judgment,” said Sanogo.

The entire household as well as a few of the regulars gathered to listen. It took me two cups of the potent ginger beer to work myself past my instincts and my training to actually tell them things I would normally have kept silent about. But I managed it. With Luce sitting beside me and holding my hand, I told a short version of the tale. Even with the things I felt obliged to leave out, it was the most I had ever told anyone at one time except the night I had spent in Vai’s arms. When I was finished, they replied with a measured silence. I could not tell if they believed me, thought I was quite deluded, or reckoned I was merely the most outrageous liar they had ever met.

“Oh, Cat!” sighed Luce. “What shall yee do now?”

I met Kayleigh’s stricken gaze. “I will get him back. I promise you.”

She nodded, then turned her face into Kofi’s shoulder.

I addressed the warden. “What happened to General Camjiata?”

Sanogo’s pleasant smile had the bracing effect of a piece of ice sliding down my back. “Jasmeen threw the man out of the town house. She owned it through one of she clan’s holding companies. We never knew it belonged to she. That is why we never suspected her.”

“She threw him out?”

“He could offer her no profit if there was none to support the Europan war. I believe the man bides at the Speckled Iguana. We shall send he and any who wish to go with him back to Europa.”

“Pay for the whole ship and all?”

“More than one ship,” said Kofi. “He have signed up five hundred men for he army.”

“We’s happy to pay for him to leave,” said Sanogo, “and good riddance to hotheaded young fools and they arseness.”

“What of Prince Caonabo and his bride?”

“Yee cousin? She I have not seen, although I hear she await the prince at the border. As for the prince, I must go back now, for the committee meet with him this afternoon to seal the First Treaty anew.”

“Why should the prince want to renew the treaty? Wouldn’t possessing Expedition’s factories, university, and port strengthen his position? Especially if he has to fight over the succession?”

“A fight over the succession is no small thing. He have no time to bother he own self with Expedition right now. But it also happen, as yee said yee own self, Cat, that a place like Expedition serve the Taino better as a free city than under Taino rule. Prince Caonabo is young and untried, but to me he seem a pragmatical sort of fellow. We shall see if he succeed, or fail.”

“What of the prisoners who were going to be executed?”

“They all vanished in the night.”

“Even Prince Haubey? The one they call Juba?”

“That man likewise.”

“No doubt with the aid of his brother. It’s good to know Prince Caonabo has his flaws. I’m not going back to Salt Island, Commissioner.”

“I would not try and make yee. The prince he own self told me yee cannot be called a salter if there was never any teeth in yee to begin with.”

Kofi said, “What shall yee do now, Cat?” Then he laughed at my expression. “Me apologies, gal. I knew better than to ask. Yee’s going after Vai. Good fortune to yee with that.”

“Come with me to the Speckled Iguana, Kofi. I could use your support.”

He rounded up Vai’s other radical friends. We walked the fifteen blocks to the Speckled Iguana on empty streets that reminded me of the night I had staggered there in the company of Bala and Gaius and come home with Vai. The streets right around the Speckled Iguana were crowded with young men and their bundled possessions waiting with the look of restless wanderers who think it long past time to hit the road. They watched us walk past as if we were enemies approaching under truce. I climbed the steps with Kofi, and he was a good companion to have, being large, sturdy, and with those wicked scars to show he had survived worse than what you could dish out.

In the common room, a man I did not recognize worked the bar, but he knew me as soon as he saw me. He indicated the door that led to the back. My companions made a path for me through the staring, silent crowd. I ducked behind the bar and pushed open the door into the room in which Drake had killed one man to save another.

In fact, Drake was the first person I saw as I entered, for he was standing to the right of the door. The chamber in which he had healed a dying man was now pristine, decorated with long tables covered with red-and-gold floral-embroidered cloths and runners of magnificent Iberian lacework down the centers. Every seat was taken. People stood all the way around the room as well. At the far end, the general sat at the head of the longest table with a number of broadsheets creased and stacked at his left hand. I recognized Captain Tira and, to my surprise, Juba, standing behind the general like aides. I recognized the young Keita merchant who had railed against the commons at the dinner party. To the general’s right, in the seat of honor, sat the proprietor of the Speckled Iguana. He was wearing the gold-braided uniform of a high-ranking officer.

My cane hung from a cord looped over a bracket in the wall.

Everyone turned to look at me as the general raised his cup as in salute.

“I hear the Wild Hunt took him,” said Drake with a sneer. “The sad fate of many an arrogant bastard of a cold mage. But I must say, he really deserved whatever he got.”

Just out of principle, I punched him, and he went down on his backside, although to my disappointment, not one person snickered. Indeed, a kind of many-throated gasp was inhaled throughout the room as heat spiked and the ornamental candles ranged along the lace centerpieces caught flame. A strange glamour flickered, and the flames snapped out. Drake rose with a peculiarly disturbing smile on his face, as if he had a surprise for me that I would not like. I suddenly remembered that I ought to be frightened of a man who could burn me alive and had been willing to do so before. But I was not afraid, not right now with my fury at what my sire had done still red-hot. He stepped back as Kofi shouldered up beside me and crossed his arms.

The general took a swallow from his cup and set it down atop a bold headline announcing the declaration of a new government for Expedition Territory. “So, Cat, have you come to join my army? I could certainly use a spy of your abilities. I’ve worked with Hassi Barahals before and hope to again. Or you could join my Amazon corps, as your mother did.”

“I’m married.”

He sighed. “I know the Wild Hunt took him. My condolences at his death. I have suffered a similar blow.”

I had no desire to mock his grief for his dead wife. Nor did he need to know what I knew. So I cut to the chase.

“I am here to reclaim my sword.”

“Are you?” he asked with a faint smile.

“I am.”

He raised an eyebrow. “An answer to a question.”

“You can give it to me, or I can take it. But I’m getting it now, because I hear you’re leaving soon to invade Europa with five hundred men.”

“One thousand one hundred and thirty-four, to be exact. We may lose or gain a few before the ships sail. I have new recruits, and old guard.”

I could not help myself. I laughed. “You’re going to conquer Europa with one thousand soldiers?”

He lifted his cup as if in toast to the fifty or so people crowded in the chamber, all of whom watched him raptly. “I started with fewer in my first command.”

“You lack a woman who walks the dreams of dragons.”

“I have Bee’s sketchbook.”

“How did you get that?”

“She gave it to me before she went to her wedding.”

“I don’t believe you. I think you stole it like you stole my sword.”

He let this accusation pass. “I also have a fire mage.”

“One with no scruples,” I said.

“As the Roman poet said, ‘The end justifies the means.’”

“A Roman would say that!”

The door into the back courtyard opened. A young man stepped into the chamber wearing a frightfully garish dash jacket of purple fabric printed with stylized orange and black stones. “Cat? I thought I heard your voice.”

“Rory!” From across the chamber, he winked at me, and I smiled. “Why are you here?”

“I didn’t want to go with our sire. So I stayed behind. This man was the only person I knew.”

“You’re coming with me now, Rory. The general is a bad man, and you’re not to trust him. And while you’re back there, I give my cold steel into your hand for long enough to bring it to me. And by the way, my friends, I would not try to stop him, because if you do I will tell him to become the saber-toothed cat he really is, and then he will eat you all up because it looks to me as if you haven’t been feeding him properly.”

“I wondered why he had your sword.” Rory grabbed the braided cord and lifted it off the bracket, careful not to touch any part of the cane or let it swing against him. He strolled down between two tables as the general watched without trying to stop him. I received the cane from Rory and gestured for him to stand behind me.

“My thanks, General, for holding on to that for me until I could retrieve it.”

He rose. “Why did the cacica die, Cat? Do you know?”

“‘Where the hand of fortune branches, Tara Bell’s child must choose.’ It isn’t always about you, General.” I made sure to offer a cutting smile to Drake. “But next time, it might be you, James.”

He rubbed his chin. “I only slept with you to get at him,” he muttered, but his resentful tone made me wonder what else simmered beneath the surface.

“Drake. Enough.” Camjiata considered me. “You know, Cat, there is another reason Tara Bell might have sworn in court that Daniel sired you. Maybe some other man sired you, someone she was willing to die to save you from by making sure Daniel had custody of you after you were born. Do you suppose that could be true?”

I could keep my lips sealed, but I hadn’t Vai’s ability to crush my emotions behind a mask of disdain.

The general’s bold eyebrows rose, and an expression shuddered across his face like the ripple of a dragon’s dream in the spirit world, obliterating the familiar world and replacing it with an unknown landscape yet to be explored. Then the flutter of surprise and disquietude vanished so utterly that I found I feared him for his self-control. “That explains why you look like Tara and not at all like Daniel. And why your hair and eyes resemble neither.” He glanced at Rory. “I see this may be more complicated than even I originally thought. We are not done, Cat, you and I.”

“No, I suppose we are not. Even so, I don’t think you understand destiny as well as you claim to.”

He nodded in a way that was both challenge and promise. “We shall see.”

With a lift of my chin, I acknowledged the old proprietor, for I did wonder what he could tell me about my mother. He nodded as in reply to my unspoken questions. Unmolested by the general’s partisans, we left.

Kofi saw me home and, before departing for the Council House, posted a guard at the gate.

“For I see the general don’ care for yee, Cat, and I don’ trust him.”

We stood in the shadow of the open gate, him outside and me within. “Why, Kofi, whence comes this change of heart about me?”

“Shall I doubt yee love Vai?”

“No, yee shall not. But I am curious.”

“Kayleigh reckon yee truly care for him. I trust she to have Vai’s interests best in she heart. But also, when I rowed yee and Vai back to the jetty that morning, yee fell asleep. That convinced me yee truly love him.”

I flushed, thinking of how strenuously Vai and I had spent that night. “Because I fell asleep?”

He chuckled as if divining my thoughts. “If yee were really after him to betray him, yee could never close yee eyes nor chance to miss one thing he said yee could use against him. But yee just lay yee head against he shoulder and slept. ’Twas sweet. ’Twas the first time I truly saw yee trust him.”

He kissed me on the cheek and went off to the business of Expedition’s future.

I took Rory in and introduced him to the family. Afterward I took Aunty Djeneba aside. “He is harmless, and very loyal.” She indicated the bar, where Rory was already buttering up Brenna, who was giggling like a gal half her age. “All right,” I agreed. “That’s a problem he has. Just you wait until he turns the charm on you. Is there some mending I can do?”

I mended through the afternoon, too restless to take the usual nap. My thoughts churned and boiled as I thought of Vai in my sire’s clutches. When the courtyard began to fill with curious customers, I took a tray. It was easier to move than to sit, and if I had to exchange brilliant quips with the regulars, that kept my mind off Vai, who might only now be realizing I had just been thrown out of the coach, for who knew how time was running for him? Would he think I was dead?

“Gal?” Uncle Joe paused beside me where I leaned against the counter, stricken by a wash of cramping or perhaps only fear. “Yee all right?”

I pressed my hand against the locket, where our hearts pulsed. Vai would know that I lived and that, because I lived, I would come after him. “Just tired, Uncle.”

“Yee go up to yee sleep, gal. Yee have the same room as before.”

I looked around to find Rory sitting between Tanny and Diantha, lounging at his ease with his long legs stretched out. He was laughing in that flirtatious way he had as Tanny told a story whose words I could not be bothered to overhear. “That will not end well, Uncle, do you think? What if they fight over him?”

He chuckled. “There is that about those two gals I think yee don’ know. Anyway, they’s of age to make up they own minds, gal. Yee go on up.”

I slipped out of the courtyard and went up with a candle to light my weary way. When I closed the door behind me, I stared, for the room was furnished with a bed and chest I knew. I set the candle on the floor and opened the lid to see all his dash jackets waiting for him. As I ran my hands through the folds of the fabric, a tear wound down my cheek.

I did not hear the door open and close. Wind blew out the candle, and he touched my shoulder.

“Catherine.”

“Vai? Blessed Tanit! Vai!”

I leaped up and embraced him as the lid banged down. He pressed his lips hotly to mine and in the dark room with the cheerful noise of the evening drinkers serenading us, we kissed until I thought I would dissolve into him.

Then I caught my breath and drew back, peering at him in the darkness, him and his annoyingly handsome face and the strange wisp-light in his beautiful eyes. My hands stroked the buttons and fine chains of embroidery woven down the front of the dash jacket he wore. My fingers itched to undress the man I loved. “Vai, how did you escape…?”

Fear squeezed my heart.

“Let me see your navel,” I said.

He laughed, but it was not Vai’s laugh. His smile cut like contempt, and although he looked exactly like Vai, his gaze was as hard as stone. “I have come to warn yee, maku. We don’ want yee here. Yee cut a path through what was closed. Elsewise that one shall not have taken blood from this country.”

“But aren’t you a spirit from the spirit world, too? Ruled by the courts?”

“Think yee so? The other land be plenty vast and ’tis not all the same. If yee reckon to force a path from this land back to them, then I promise yee, we shall eat yee before yee can get there. For yee have no right to trample here in places yee know nothing of and don’ own.”

He vanished in a hissing patter like the scatter of sand melded with the scent of overripe guavas. That, too, dissipated, leaving me with no light, trembling hands, and the burning memory of his mouth on mine. I sank onto the bed Vai had built for us and for the longest time I could not move, until the door opened and Rory squeezed in.

“Cat? What is it? I could smell your tears.”

He stretched out beside me, saying nothing more. Soothed by the comfort of his presence, I slept.

I woke at dawn, rumpled and mussed, because I had slept in my clothes. Rory was gone, nor had I any idea how long he had stayed with me. I straightened my pagne and blouse and hurried downstairs to do my business and tidy up. The little lads and lasses were lined up, ready to march off hand in hand to school. I gave them each a kiss and promised to buy them a sweet even though I had no money and no idea how to get hold of the money Vai had been given by the mansa.

The opia’s warning haunted me as I ate an orange and considered my options. Yet it was easier to move than to sit, so I went out to walk the old neighborhood. I returned from visiting my friends on Tailors’ Row to find Rory sitting on a bench with Luce giggling on his knee.

I marched over to them and dragged her off. “That is enough of that!”

She set fists on hips. “I’s sixteen this year. Old enough to know me own mind!”

“Rory, if you do anything with her I would not approve of, I shall castrate you.”

He drew himself up, affronted, but before he could speak, I pressed a hand to his chest. “How did you get Vai’s jacket?”

“The general gave it to me on Hallows’ Night. After we retreated back to the big house. It was generous of him to take me away from the ball court, considering some of those Taino soldiers were beginning to look at me like they thought they would have to try to kill me. My other clothes were all ripped and torn. Then after I had dressed, this woman came, quite shrieking, I must tell you, Cat, for it made my ears hurt. Afterward she had the nerve to put her hand on my-”

“I can guess.”

“After the way she complained, I can’t imagine why she would think I would want to be petted by her!”

“How did the bed and the chest get here?”

“I don’t know everything, Cat! I can’t imagine why you expect me to! Someone else came, and there was a great deal of argument but at that moment I was down in one of the guardrooms very involved with-”

“With something I obviously don’t need to know. Luce! Go help your grandmother!”

With a mulish grimace, she trudged off, casting glances back over her shoulder.

“I was sure you would not mind if I wore the jacket since I had otherwise nothing but a sack.”

“No, that’s fine. I suppose Sanogo must have sent the bed and chest over here.”

The sound of horse hooves and carriage wheels drawing up outside made me turn. There came a silence, then the bang of a door shut impatiently. A dark head looked in through the partly open gate.

“There you are, dearest! Is this truly where you stayed all that time? How very quaint.”

Bee wore the jacket embroidered with axes and a pagne so spotless a snowy white that I winced with each of her steps for fear some tiny smattering of dust would kick up to stain it.

“How very fortunate I was to land here,” I retorted, refraining from shrieking and throwing my arms around her. “How did you know I was here? Did Sanogo send word?”

“Really, Cat! Why must you ask questions to which the answer is self-evident? The general stole my sketchbook, but fortunately I dreamed about you last night. Where is Vai?” She looked about with curiosity and just a smidgen of irritating condescension, but she was my Bee, after all. I had to forgive her that.

I had to, because her expression altered as her eyes widened and her voice dropped to a whisper hoarse with genuine alarm. “What happened?” Reaching me, she grasped my hands tightly.

Behind, at the gate, a pair of Taino guards appeared to stand at attention. Rory put an arm around Luce, Uncle Joe set a machete on the counter for them to see he was armed, and Aunty Djeneba politely ventured forward to offer the soldiers juice from a cup, which they politely accepted as a sign of their peaceful intentions.

I met Bee’s gaze, as she met mine. “My sire is Master of the Wild Hunt. He killed the cacica for the sacrifice. And then he took Vai.”

Her grip crushed my fingers. “Did he kill him?”

“He carried him away alive. Now it is up to me to get him back.” I shook off her grip. “Bee, you really must allow me to introduce you to everyone. Do you have some exalted title now with which I must address you? Your Fragrant Pompousness, perhaps?”

“Nothing so splendid. Your Exalted Magnificence will do.”

“Noble Ba’al, Bee. Are you really a queen now, like the didos of old?”

“I am something better. I can walk the dreams of dragons, and because of the very clever thinking of my dearest cousin, I know where to hide on Hallows’ Night to escape the Wild Hunt. That means there are a great many things I’ve always wanted to do I’ll now have time for.”

“Like what?”

“Where do I start? Revolutions to plot. Enemies to crush. Handsome men to rescue.”

I actually laughed, because she heartened me so. “But what about you, Bee? What happened to you?”

“Blessed Tanit!” she said portentously. It seemed she had reassured herself that I was for the moment safe, for she turned to look around the courtyard and include every person there in the axe-blow of her smile. “I can scarcely wait to tell you the tale!”

Look out for the final book in

The Spiritwalker Trilogy: