Wellspring of Chaos

LXXV

The next morning was sunny, but the air felt damper, and Kharl could see clouds just above the horizon to the northeast. Since he had promised to report to Hagen on what he had learned from Lyras, Kharl found the captain even before he went to the shed to work with Tarkyn.

Hagen listened as Kharl reported on what Lyras had said. When Kharl had finished, Hagen tilted his head, not quite nodding, then tugged on his earlobe. “Lord Estloch had told me about the personal guards, but I don’t think he wanted to believe Ilteron had hired so many. As for Malcor, that I can believe. He comes from the old line.”

Kharl didn’t know anything about the old line and decided not to ask. “And no one, not one lord or factor, said a word?”

“Oh, doubtless they’re all telling each other now that they knew it all along and that they each had told Lord Estloch in confidence, but that for reasons of his own, Lord Estloch chose not to act. By sunset, every one of them will believe it.”

Kharl thought he understood better why Hagen preferred the sea to the Great House in Valmurl.

“You aren’t that surprised, now, are you?” asked Hagen.

“No, ser. I’d have to say that I’d hoped for better, but I didn’t expect it.”

Hagen smiled, sadly. “That’s a good precept. Hope and work for better, but don’t expect it. Are you going to see Lyras again?”

“I’d thought to, ser, but not for a while. Wouldn’t do any good right now.” Kharl wasn’t sure that another visit would help, not until he’d had a chance to try out some of what the mage had suggested, at least. He also wondered about the mysterious references to the staff.

“That’s probably for the best. When you do, let me know if you find out anything else.”

“Yes, ser. I’ll be heading back to the shed now.”

Hagen just nodded, his thoughts clearly turning elsewhere.

Kharl was the first in the shed. He’d fired up the old stove and was setting up the lathe when Tarkyn arrived, closing the door behind him.

“So…what’d you find out from Lyras?” asked Tarkyn. “Didn’t want to ask last night, not till you talked to the captain and not with other ears around.”

“Ilteron has some white mages, and it’s likely that someone named Malcor killed Lord Estloch.”

“Malcor…name’s familiar. Don’t know why.”

“I’d never heard of him, but the captain had. Said he was out of the old line.”

“Oh…him. His father was the out-of-consort son of Lord Estloch’s uncle. The uncle had but daughters, and couldn’t pass on the title. That’s how Estloch got it.”

Kharl thought he understood, not that it made sense to him. A son was a son; a daughter was a daughter. Both were children. For a moment, the images of Arthal and Warrl flashed to mind, and he swallowed, wishing that he could have done more for them…somehow. But there wasn’t much else that he could do. Not at the moment.

“Anything else? That you can say?”

“There wasn’t much else. Lyras talked about why the Emperor of Hamor didn’t send his best white wizards to Austra.”

“That’s trouble.”

“And Ilteron has more personal guards than anyone knew. That was about it.”

“Wager that’s more than most folks knew. Captain pleased?”

“He seemed to know most of it, except for Malcor. He’s worried about something.”

“’Course he’s worried. He’s trying to advise a lord who’s barely more than a boy, and that lord’s going to be attacked by his brother who’s being supported by the Emperor of Hamor…I’d worry, too.”

So would Kharl. Left unspoken was the understanding that Hagen was so closely linked to Estloch and Ghrant that if Ilteron triumphed, Hagen would lose his ships or even his life if he didn’t flee Austra.

“You about ready with that lathe?” asked Tarkyn.

Furwyl had added another project for the carpenters-a second weapons locker beside the ladder to the poop deck-and he’d said Hagen wanted it finished in the next few days.

“Second weapons locker, along with everything else,” Kharl said, half to himself, as he made the final adjustments to the lathe settings. “That’s not good…”

“These days, not much is,” countered Tarkyn.

Kharl couldn’t say much to that.

By the end of the day, when he left the carpenter shed, Kharl still had questions swirling through his head. The clouds had moved in from the northeast by midafternoon, and a fine cold rain filtered out of a dark gray sky.

He’d really been too busy to think in any depth about what Lyras had said, but the questions hadn’t gone away. Although Kharl had not tried it, not having a forge that he could use while not being watched, he thought, just from his earlier efforts with iron, that he might be able to forge something like black iron. What he would use it for was another question. He clearly had no feel for what lay deep beneath the earth, although he could sense life and patterns within perhaps a cubit of the surface.

Kharl moved quickly from the shed to the bunkhouse. He was headed for the mess and common room when he recalled the kettle test suggested by Lyras. With a half smile, he made his way to the door of the kitchen area and slipped inside. As he had hoped, there was a kettle on the huge and antique iron stove.

Kharl stared at the kettle. While, with his senses, he could feel the swirl of order and chaos in the steam that poured from the spout, he could not seem to move it. He thought he could stop the steam, because when he concentrated on touching the bits of order and chaos, the steam cloud did not change shape, but he did not try that for long, since that was all he seemed able to do and since he didn’t want anyone noticing. As far as moving the steam, light as it might be, he could not. While he didn’t know how, even in a general way, he doubted that was the problem.

“What you looking at, carpenter?” asked Yilyt, the ship’s cook. “Watching us cook isn’t gonna get you fed earlier.”

“I wondered what you were fixing.”

“Got some kalfin-good white fish-hard to come by. Be frying that up…”

Kharl nodded. To him most fish tasted the same. “Thank you.” He slipped out and went to the washhouse adjoining the bunkhouse. The only water was cold-ice-cold-and washing was a trial, but Kharl had always preferred being as clean as he could reasonably be.

Since he knew supper was still not ready when he headed back through the rain that was changing to a colder and heavier downpour, he stopped for just a moment and picked a leaf from the scraggly plant outside the front door to the bunkhouse. He wasn’t sure whether it was a bush or a weed. Probably a weed from the broad leaf with the thornlike tips.

Carrying it gently in his left hand, he stepped into the common room. Except for several riggers that he knew only by sight and name, the tables were mostly empty. Kharl sat down at one end of a bench. He set the leaf on the table and looked at it, both with eyes and order senses.

Even though he had picked it, there was still some sense of life, although that was fading. Kharl could sense the way the order and chaos ebbed, almost like tiny threads, notched or “hooked” at the ends. Almost on a whim, he tried to link those “hooks.”

The leaf looked subtly different.

When Kharl touched it, it felt as hard as iron. He undid the twists in the order and chaos that he had somehow created, and both order and chaos disintegrated into minute fragments, a touch of white mist and one of black seeping unseen into the air. The leaf itself went limp. He could tell it was also dead, totally dead.

Somehow, he could make things so hard that they were like armor, but doing so would kill anything living. He just sat there in thought for a time.

Argan and Reisl slid onto the benches across the table from Kharl, setting platters down. At the clunk, Kharl looked up.

“Better get some. Looks good,” said Reisl.

“Oh…thank you.” As Kharl stood, he looked at the table for the leaf, but all that was left was a whitish powder. Almost dazed, he walked to the end of the mess line and waited for his platter, then picked up a mug of a very poor ale, and returned to the table across from Reisl and Argan, sitting down, and taking a swallow of the ale. He was thirsty.

“What were you doing?” asked Argan. “We came by and you were looking at some funny leaf. Didn’t even hear us.”

“Coulda fired a cannon at you. Don’t think you’d have moved,” added Reisl.

“Guess I was tired, or hungry,” Kharl replied. “We’ve been working on a second weapons locker. Got the frame tied to the poop frames, and we’ll have most of it done tomorrow. If the rain ever lets up. Got waterproofs over it now, but we’ll still need sunlight to do it right.”

“Another weapons locker?” Reisl looked at Argan. “Can’t say I like that. Captain hear something about more pirates?”

“Maybe it has to do with the lord out west, the one that’s rebelled against Lord Ghrant,” suggested Argan.

“Say the Hamorians might back him,” mumbled Reisl, looking at Kharl. “What do you know about that?”

“Some folks say he’s got a white wizard and more personal guards than most hill lords,” Kharl admitted. “He’s the brother of Lord Ghrant.”

“Brother against brother, and lords, too. That’d be nasty. Be glad when we’re outa dry dock,” Reisl said.

Kharl just nodded. The kalfin was actually fairly good, firm under a crispy crust, and the potatoes were less lumpy than usual.

“Think we’ll get back afloat by next eightday…”

“…Hemmen or Brysta next port…captain hasn’t said…”

Kharl didn’t say too much during supper, but tried to be pleasant and not withdraw into himself.

When Reisl finished, he looked up at Kharl. “Too wet to go to the inn. You want to join the game?”

Kharl smiled. “Thanks, but I had a long day.”

“Just asking.”

“Better that I don’t.” And it was, for more than a few reasons, since Kharl suspected he would have been tempted to try to use his order-senses on the dice.

Instead, after returning his empty platter, he walked outside into the cold rain and stood under the eaves of the bunkhouse next to the wall. He studied the small puddle at his feet, just looking at it for a moment, then taking it in with his senses, trying first to see what the patterns of order and chaos might be, and then following them. He touched the water, ever so lightly, with what he thought of as his order-sense. It seemed to grow still, the way the steam had. Then, he could sense almost what were little hooks on each of the fragments. Somehow, he looked, and thought, and twisted the hooks so that they all locked together.

He almost staggered, because he could feel that he’d exerted some great effort. He looked down at the small puddle, and watched as water droplets falling from the edge of the eaves splattered on the smooth unmoving surface of the water. Had he turned the puddle to clear ice?

Slowly, he bent down and extended his fingers. The changed water was more like cool glass, perhaps slightly warmer than the water had been, but definitely not frozen. He straightened and then stamped his left boot heel on the glassy puddle. The puddle was as hard as stone or steel.

Kharl took out his belt knife and bent down, drawing the tip across the hard water. Even with the unchanged water falling from the eaves and coating the order-hard water, he could see that the knife made no impression, not even the faintest scratch. After a moment, he replaced the knife and looked at the hard water.

Finally, he concentrated and untwisted the hooks of order and chaos. The water shimmered and a faint steamy fog rose from the puddle as the colder water from the eaves struck what had been order-hardened water.

Kharl was suddenly exhausted, as though he had worked at a forge or a lathe all day, then run five or even ten kays. He’d wanted to try some of the other things Lyras had suggested, but he was tired, far too tired. Without looking back, he slowly trudged back inside the bunkhouse, past Reisl and the deckhands gaming. He nodded to Reisl, and got a smile in return.

As he continued down the hallway, past the rooms for the mates toward the bunkroom, he could hear the voices behind him.

“…something about him…scary…”

“…good man,” Reisl answered. “You’d keep to yourself, too, if you’d lost everything he did…consort, children, cooperage…”

“…’sides,” said another voice, “he’s the one found the friggin’ shipworms…could be we’d all be in the deep locker…”

The voices faded out as Kharl slowly undressed and climbed into the bunk. The blackness of sleep was more than welcome.