The other lands

CHAPTER TEN

Sire Neen took a perverse pleasure in recalling all the things he knew about the world that the Akarans did not. It was too long a list for him to go through in one sitting, but he often tried. It soothed him. Their ignorance was as much a balm to him as mist was, although combined with the drug's effects it was an even greater balm. Leaguemen had never truly come off mist, not even when Aliver was alive and making the stuff torture people's dreams. For a time, they were plagued by nightmares similar to those of the general populace, but they pushed through them. The drug they used was of much higher quality than what they provided to the masses, and with experimentation they distilled a variation they could again use without torment. For them, the drug was fundamental to every aspect of their lives, as important as water, food, air. Waking or sleeping, for clarity or bliss, to focus or lose oneself completely: mist aided it all.

As he sat in the plush banquet room of the Ambergris, the massive ship they had switched to at the Outer Isles, the thought of lecturing Corinn slicked the leagueman's hands with sweat and stiffened him with pent-up desire. He hated her, and he wished her to know it in her final moments, when she gave everything to the league and they destroyed her. If she had accepted the league's offer to meet the Lothan Aklun herself, he would be beside himself with expectation, luxuriating in the surprise he was about to present her with. Having to settle for Dariel instead was some compensation, and he would do his best to relish what awaited him.

Peppering his hatred was the fact that he also hungered to consume the queen. Often his mist trances were little more than long sessions in which he lectured Queen Corinn Akaran. He stood above her, taking delicious pleasure out of testifying to all the many ways she was not the power she believed. She knelt below him, a slack-mouthed expression of awe on her lovely face, her gestures promises of submission-faithful, subservient, pious submission.

It was no accident that his concubines were chosen for their resemblance to her. They were fine models, really, coiffed and manicured and even altered anatomically at times. He loved it that they were each so alike while also tasting and sounding and smelling and being different. The same and yet different. They were a great pleasure to him. Shame they never lasted long in his service. Shame also that he had opted not to bring one along on this trip. It would not do for Prince Dariel-a whelp he loathed in a different way-to spot her and note the resemblance.

But you should not complain, he thought. Things are about to change completely.

Sire Neen looked around the table in the plush banquet room of the Ambergris, happy that his thoughts were trapped within his skull and could not be read by the roomful of people. They were two weeks out from the isles, already well into the Gray Slopes. The ship rocked with the slightest recognition of their waterborne state, but the room itself was as formally decorated and numerously staffed as a palace. A necessity, as few leaguemen really liked the sea.

A little more patience, Sire Neen thought, and all will be made right. Much will be revealed. Old scores settled. Oh, some will be surprised. Some will be shocked. Saddened. But not I! Not I. Nothing will surprise me. I am the surpriser, not the surprised.

"So we are halfway to the Other Lands," he said, lifting his voice so that it carried through the noise of conversation and dining. "What do you make of the trip so far, Your Highness?"

Dariel, sitting across the round table from him, crooked a grin and spoke to the gathered company of leaguemen, naval officers, imperial officials, and concubines. "I'll admit to being impressed," he said. He played with his food for a moment, absently pushing his uneaten morsels around with the point of his knife. "The Range was like nothing I'd ever imagined. To think that the league has sailed through that all these years."

"It is nothing," Sire Neen said. "Nothing for us, at least. We who truly know the sea."

The prince showed no sign he caught the insult. He shook his head in childlike wonder. "And those creatures today-just bizarre. I'll dream of them tonight, I'm sure."

Sire Neen dipped a spoon in his soup, a clear broth filled with soft morsels of white fish. Holding the spoon halfway to his mouth, he said, "If you wake up screaming, Prince, we'll be sure to send someone to comfort you."

The young woman to the prince's left touched a finger to his wrist and drew a line up his arm. "I'd be happy to take care of that," she said. "It wouldn't do for the prince to dream of beasts, not when there are more pleasant things to be haunted by."

Dariel cocked his head toward her with solicitous deference but said nothing.

She returned his gaze with an annoying amount of enthusiasm-from Neen's perspective. He had instructed the concubines to be gracious and generous to the prince in everything. He rather wished they did not perform so willingly. He slipped the soup into his mouth. Feigning rapture at the taste, he closed his eyes. He needed a few moments free of the sight of the prince. By the gods, the boy irritated him. So self-satisfied. Such a pretense of innocence and openness, as if he were not a killer of thousands, as if they would ever forget those who died at the prince's hands on the platforms.

Fortunately, there had been a couple of moments when the prince's naive composure had been rattled. Both had been pleasant to witness and were some comfort to remember.

When they had first sailed out onto the wave peaks of the Range had been one such moment. In truth, the sight still amazed the leagueman, even though he had witnessed it scores of times. They were not sure what caused them, but the captains believed that some change in the features far below the surface of the water affected the currents above. Nine days out from the Outer Isles, sailing due west with good winds, the Ambergris-massive as it was to human eyes-had been but a cork bobbing on a gray-black fathomless ocean. They had been days riding swells of thirty and forty feet, but at that unmarked boundary all had changed.

Far below the bottom dropped, or rose, or undulated for all they knew. Whatever caused it, the result at the surface was that the swells rose into peaks, sheer reaches hundreds of feet high. Riding up them was like grinding over stone, slow and painful. The hull of the ship trembled with the effort, and each time Neen had a momentary fear that the boat would slip backward. It never did, though. Cresting the summit, the heavy bosom of the Ambergris thrust far out into the air, spray whipping around those on board like a creature intent on ripping them from the deck. And as the ship tilted onto the slope, the descent switched to a mad acceleration, reaching speeds beyond any seen on land. The Ambergis became a careening leviathan at the edge of control, moving so fast the water around them hissed as if being scorched by the hull's passing. They plunged down until the prow dug into the base of the next wave, submerging the fore portions of the deck for several long moments before slowly rising, righting. Then it began all over again. And again.

Sire Neen went on deck only briefly as they entered the Range. He had the pleasure of seeing the expression of awe on Dariel's face as he looked at the seething immensity of giants rolling toward them, rank after rank for as far as the eye could see. He retreated belowdecks just after, closing his eyes even as he felt his way toward his cabin, keeping the image of the prince's tremulous cheeks and loose lips in his mind.

Yes, that was a pleasure, Neen thought, still chewing that same mouthful of meat, the dinner conversation revolving around him. He heard it, took in most of what was being said at some level, but the focus of his mist-enhanced mind moved elsewhere freely. Today was a pleasure as well. How close, Prince, how close you came to being tipped into the mouths of devils. If only you knew…

They had come out of the Range the day before. The sea had returned to its normal swells. Though the waves remained high by most standards, many gathered on deck to marvel at the relative calm of the ocean compared to what they had passed through. The Ambergris once more plowed its course in serene control. Sire Neen had stood for a time amusing himself with Rialus Neptos. The adviser was ghostly pale, his cheeks sunken and his voice raw-the result, no doubt, of days of gut-churning seasickness. Neen made a point of speaking about food, with which Neptos still seemed to have a troubled relationship. It was a small amusement, tormenting Neptos, passing the time.

The leagueman had expected the creatures to appear that day, but the moment of their arrival was so sudden it snatched his breath away. He had been standing beside Rialus when the lookouts shouted from the crow's nests. The character of the ocean all around them changed in an instant. As far as the eye could see in any direction the water churned and undulated and writhed. Hundreds of large creatures broke the surface, swimming at speed through the waves like dolphins. But these were not dolphins.

"Are they…" Dariel's voice came from behind them, wavering and thin. The prince reached the railing and grasped it.

Sire Neen glanced over at him. "Yes," he said, answering the incomplete question. "Sea wolves. Not truly a fitting name. They're not like wolves at all. They are like nothing really, except themselves."

When he looked back, the creatures were all around the ship. They rose from the depths, quickly taking shape behind the liquid glass of the green water. Their heads were great knotted bulbs of waxy-looking pink flesh, barnacled and gashed and grimed by sea slime. It was hard to gauge their size from the deck. Even from that height it was clear they were larger than any whales seen in the waters around the Known World or even out at the Vumu Archipelago. But they were not whales. They swam with the combined action of flippers that lined their long bodies and an inhaling and exhaling propulsion of water. They swelled and deflated, rose and fell, so close together that it was hard to tell where each individual began and ended.

"Look at them," Dariel said. "I can see why they're feared."

"The Giver never created these!" Rialus said. "They're monsters!"

"Perhaps not," Sire Neen said. "He never did have much imagination. Anyway, there they are, no matter how they came to be." He motioned toward them with his thin wrist, dismissive and casual. "Watch what they do now."

The sea wolves drew in tighter around the brig, so churning the water that it seemed the Ambergris plowed through a sea of the creatures. They jockeyed for position along the massive wall of the hull. They caressed it, bumped it, tried to slide up out of the water as if they would climb it. They slapped at it with tentacled arms that peeled away from their bodies and moved with fluid strength. They clearly wished to gain some purchase on the hull. But they could not do so. They slid off the slick white coating. Some propelled themselves out of the water, slammed the hull with the weight of their bodies. These just dropped back into the froth, frustrated.

One creature, marked from the rest by an enormous barnacled protrusion on its head, squirmed in the water just beneath them, keeping pace. It rolled to the side and for a moment seemed to study them with one enormous yellow eye. The pupil contracted, perhaps from the light of the bright sky, but even to Sire Neen it seemed the beast was focusing his attention on him, picking him out from the many gaping faces looking over the rail. The leagueman had the sudden urge to grab the prince and toss him overboard, right toward that eye and waiting mouth. It was a fantasy urge, for he had no physical strength to match Dariel's, but it came to him so strongly he tasted metal on his tongue. But the moment passed. The creature rolled away and vanished.

"There are so many of them," Dariel said. His tone had changed, gone boyish, filled with curiosity. "What do they eat?"

"Your Majesty, how should I know? They don't eat us; that's the important thing."

Rialus's voice wavered as he asked, "We are not in danger, then?"

Sire Neen patted him on the back, nudging him with just enough force to press his torso against the railing. "So long as you don't fall in, Rialus, you're in no danger whatsoever. On occasion an unwary sailor has been snatched from the deck of a clipper, but we're well above their reach here on the Ambergris. In the early years, of course, we lost many ships of all sizes. These creatures seem to hate us or hunger for us. Which is perhaps the same thing. They tore ships apart and devoured whole crews. For a time we tried to shoot our way through with ballista mounted around the deck railing. We still lost most of our ships. But that was before we mastered the skin, and this was long ago. We are quite safe now."

"This 'skin,'" Dariel said, "what makes it work? Is it just a paint of sorts?"

"A paint?" Sire Neen showed his disdain for the simplicity of that concept. "Paint is like a condiment to sea wolves. They eat it with the ship, to improve its flavor. Our skin is no paint, but-forgive me-that is all I can say about it."

"I must know what this skin is," Dariel said. "I'm sure we could put it to use, even in the Inner Sea!"

"There are no sea wolves in the Inner Sea, Your Highness, a fact that you should be glad of. As to skin itself, that's a trade secret. The league must humbly hold that information close. We are only merchants, Prince Dariel, allow us our secrets."

Sire Neen opened his eyes again, realizing that his name had been called, pulling him back from his reverie.

Dariel watched him from across the table, a look of amused curiosity on his face.

"I'm sorry," Sire Neen said, "what was it you asked?"

Dariel said, "I asked if there were any other surprises in store for me, Sire."

The leagueman held back the impulse to run his tongue over the rounded nubs of his teeth. He held the prince's gaze with a smiling visage while several others offered wry remarks. Would it surprise you, he thought, to know that I wake every morning imagining your downfall? Would it surprise you to know that I'm not going to make amends with the Lothan Aklun? Instead, I will destroy them. Would it surprise you to know that you are to be offered up as a gesture of good faith to a people who will eat your soul? As a slave, a toy, a plaything for monsters? Would it surprise you to know that once the Aklun are gone, there will be no greater power in the world than the league? Would it surprise you if I said, right now, "Prepare your knees for bending, Prince. Prepare your knees"?

Eventually, the others quieted and it fell to Sire Neen to answer. He said, "Oh, certainly. If there is one thing I can promise you with certainty, Your Highness, it is that surprises await you."