Artemis Invaded (14 page)

“Is it Griffin? Tell me and I'll work on resigning myself.”

“No. It is not Griffin. I feel for him much as I do for you, but without the added complication of a pleasant memory. ‘It's not anyone or if it is anyone it is…”

“Not that bastard Julyan!”

“Not Julyan. Definitely not Julyan. But how I feel is all tangled up with what happened with Julyan. I adored him with a depth of passion that embarrasses me when I recall it. I would recite his name in my head rather than think. I wrote him poems, set them to music … I would have carved his name on my heart. Not only did he reject me—I think I could accept that—now I have learned that what I worshipped was a lie.”

“I'm not lying…”

Adara held a finger to her lips in a bid for silence. “Terrell, I don't think you lie. I don't know myself, don't trust myself … Please! I need you as a friend. Don't make that impossible.”

Terrell slumped against the tree. “There are times…” He left the thought unfinished, visibly wrenched himself back to other subjects. “Do you think Leto is somehow controlling Griffin or is it only that their desires run in harness?”

“I don't know, nor do I think I would be the one to find out.” For the first time, Adara noticed that Terrell's eyes were bloodshot, that there were smudges beneath them. “You aren't sleeping well. Why not?”

Terrell shifted uneasily. “I don't like sleeping in that place. The stench of death is long gone but it feels like a charnel house to me. But Griffin will sleep nowhere else. He has taken over one of the sleeping rooms, even though the air is still and stale. He resents any time spent away, so I have stayed nearby.”

Adara tilted her head and studied him. “And…”

“I don't like my dreams when I do sleep. By day Griffin tells me what this device may have been for, what that press was intended to shape. All are horrors. The armor is the least offensive—Leto calls it ‘spaveks.' At least the spaveks were meant to protect the wearer, but the weapons … By night I dream of old wars…” His voice dropped low and husky, as if admitting to some shame. “Or Griffin does. I'm not sure whose dreams are whose anymore.”

Adara wanted to hold Terrell, to stroke the rough velvet of his cheek in comfort, but she knew those gestures would be misinterpreted.

“I don't think I would be the one to find out what is driving Griffin,” Adara said, “but you might, my friend. Stop running from those dreams. Take control of them. Find out why Griffin dreams so, and if his dreams are of his own choosing.”

Terrell rubbed his eyes with his fists. “I was afraid you would say something like that. But you're right. I am factotum-trained, factotum-bred to my core. My soul tells me to protect this seegnur … But how can I protect him from himself?”

“First find out if the protecting is needed,” Adara said. “Then we decide.”

“And you?”

“Leto is a mystery, but legends call her Artemis's mother. Perhaps in learning more about the daughter, I can learn whether or not the mother is one we can trust.” She gave a lopsided smile. “I have been saying I cannot call Artemis to me, but I'll admit, I haven't tried very hard. If you will take on Griffin, then I will work harder to understand Artemis.”

Terrell thrust out his hand. “Deal!”

Adara accepted the clasp with a hard squeeze, noting that her claws had retreated. “Now, let's go down and see the horses and Sam the Mule. They look fine from here, but a closer look is never a bad idea.”

*   *   *

Unlike Spirit Bay or Crystalaire—both of which had been designed by the seegnur not only to provide habitation for some of the residents of Artemis, but also to cater to the whims of the visiting seegnur—Chankley's Harbor had evolved organically. The difference showed. The seegnur's building materials had been incredibly tough. Even after five hundred years, many buildings looked fresher and newer than those of more modern construction. The trim on those structures never needed repainting and it took a ferocious storm to damage the roofs.

By contrast, Chankley's Harbor was a grungy place, looking exactly like what it was: a village that had grown up because the small harbor was a good one. There were sheds for storing nets, rope, and extra sail, dwellings that were hardly any better than sheds to hold the fisher folk when they came ashore. Probably the best maintained structure in the place was the stone well. Fresh water so near a saltwater bay was not a resource to be treated lightly. The docks were built on stone pilings, with wooden planks, meant to bear against both storm and hard use.

“A working village,” the Old One said as they approached down the overgrown, twisting landside trail. “Not a remnant of ancient privilege.”

Since until a short time before the Old One had lived in the seegnur's former landing facility, spending a fair amount of time in the abandoned shuttle repair facility beneath Mender's Isle, Julyan did not think he was out of line for finding this statement hypocritical.

He held his tongue. The Old One enjoyed seeing how people would react to his various odd comments. After being lured into several “philosophical” discussions that only served to prove that the Old One could think with more twists than a basket full of baby snakes, Julyan had decided stoic silence was his best course of action. He suspected his silence amused the Old One, too, but at least silence didn't force him to think in a fashion that made his head ache.

“They know me here,” Julyan said. “Unless you want to be seen before I have a chance to tell Captain Bore Chankley that you'd prefer word of your return did not spread, it's better I go ahead.”

“Go, by all means,” the Old One said, his pale grey eyes twinkling with mild amusement. “Although I think Bore would be wise enough to anticipate my wishes and assure his people's silence.”

Julyan replied with a terse nod, thinking that the Old One was probably correct. The Chankley Clan had worked for the Old One for some time now, arranging for supplies to be dropped off at Mender's Isle. Although many of those who crewed the ships had no idea who their mysterious client was, Captain Chankley certainly did. He was the sort of slimy eel who would do almost anything—including violating a prohibited area—if paid enough. But he'd want the security of knowing who he was working for, so he could drag him under with him if he started drowning.

Perhaps because the landside trail was so infrequently used—it was far easier to reach Chankley's Harbor by boat than by land—Julyan's approach attracted attention. Slatternly women and sloppy men drifted out of various structures, looking—despite the midday hour—as if they'd just woken up.

Of course,
Julyan thought,
most of them probably have. The boats would have been out either very early or overnight, depending on where they were fishing. Unless they had an extraordinary catch, most of the work would have been finished hours ago.

Julyan swaggered into the village square, chucked the prettiest of the young women under the chin, and said, “So, where's the captain? I've news for him, news worth coin, not just barter.”

Lots of the sailors here could have claimed the title “captain,” since the boss of any boat with a crew larger than two merited the title, but in Chankley Harbor only one man was “the captain.” It was rumored that Bore Chankley had assaulted his own father for the title, so Julyan guessed that no one was willing to push the point.

“I'm here,” came a rasping voice from the doorway of the least offensive of the structures—the one that nearly merited the word “house” rather than “hut” or “shack.” “Julyan Hunter! Almost didn't know you with that white hair and those clothes. So, you weren't drowned. Figured not. You're too mean to drown.”

Julyan didn't protest. He and Captain Chankley understood each other too well for that, and their mutual respect made certain the rest of the captain's people treated Julyan with proper deference.

Bore Chankley had hips like a snake and shoulders that testified to a lifetime of hauling on lines and setting sail. His eyes were framed by deep lines that gave his face a serious cast, but his mouth showed he knew how to laugh. Of course, what he laughed at wasn't what amused other people. A scar ran from his hairline, across his left eyelid, over the nose, and trailed off somewhere in his cheek. The formal explanation was that it was a cut from a rope, but legend said it had been bestowed by his father in a drunken rage.

“A word with you, good captain,” Julyan said, at his most polite. “I've brought with me a bottle of excellent brandy…”

Captain Chankley was not an alcoholic as his father had been, but he liked a nip or three when he wasn't going to be sailing.

“I won't say no.” He gestured to a gazebo that stood apart from the other structures and offered a pleasant view of the bay. “Wait for me there. I'm just awake and need to splash water on my face.”

Julyan moved in that direction, listening carefully when Bore Chankley stopped to talk with a couple of the women, but all he caught was an order for food to be brought to the gazebo. He didn't think it was a code of any sort, but he resolved not to eat anything the captain didn't first.

He slouched into the chair that offered the most cover from being seen. He wasn't worried about keeping the Old One waiting. When things were going his way that one had a hunter's patience, and he didn't plan to sail until well after dark. Julyan wouldn't be surprised if the Old One hadn't found a comfortable spot and was catching a nap, leaving Seamus to watch.

When Bore Chankley joined Julyan, he had taken time to comb and braid his long chestnut hair, then tie it beneath a bandana. He brought two wineglasses with him—very fine cut crystal that looked like seegnur vintage—and set them on the tabletop between them.

“Old One gifted them to me,” he said. “He alive?”

“Yes, though he'd prefer that not get around.”

“Figured he would be. Take more than water to kill that one. I've heard stories from before he settled here. Weathered the worst hurricane anyone had seen and came ashore, clinging to a spar, nothing more than leather and bones. Been eating shark. Had wedged the teeth in a crack in the spar to prove it. Man who told me had one of those teeth as a charm from his grandfather. Swore it made him proof against drowning.”

“Did it?”

“Don't know. Got killed in a squabble over a woman.”

“Heh…” Julyan chuckled. “Old One wants to go to Mender's Isle tonight if weather's fit. He says it will be. Got a crew who'll dare it?”

Bore Chankley snorted. “Take more than a few lights and weird voices to scare my sailors.”

“Voices?”

“Yeah. Heard 'em myself, since the waters around the Haunted Islands are my fishing grounds. Don't know if they were spirits, but they didn't speak like humans. I've sailed far enough to hear lots of dialects. This was different. Nothing like anyone had ever heard. Scared some of the crew.”

“Not you,” Julyan said.

Bore Chankley shrugged. “Ain't heard a sound yet that can kill a man. Things that make a sound, sure, but some of the worst sounds are made by little things like loons and bullfrogs.”

“Point.” Julyan spilled more of the amber brandy into Captain Chankley's glass, feeling a familiar thrill. It was almost the color of Adara's eyes. “You'll sail then?”

“To the reef. Won't bust a ship, not even for the Old One.”

“Fair. I suspect he has worked out a way to deal with the reef.”

“He would.”

Julyan asked a few more questions about the apparitions on the Mender's Isle, but Bore Chankley hadn't heard much more than Loremaster Flamen. When the bottle was empty, Julyan excused himself.

“I'll just go and make arrangements on my end. We'll be down after full dark.”

“And we'll sail.” Captain Chankley's smile was sardonic. “It'll be just like old times.”

*   *   *

Leto's complex was an archeologist's dream come true. Parts of it were still sealed off—Leto claimed not to be able to operate the door locks. However, what was available was sufficient to keep Griffin occupied for months. The complex had two main sections: one for research and development; the other for residential needs. The research and development area consisted of a large lab with numerous open workstations, a bunker in which prototypes were racked, and, on a lower level, a fabrication area. Almost all the equipment was nonfunctional, but Leto had reactivated a few of the stations.

Griffin would have been perfectly happy, except that Leto seemed to have taken a dislike to Adara. The facility coordinator (which was the title Leto gave herself) had been fine with Adara's presence as long as there had been clearing away to do. However, now that the hauling and carrying was done, Leto grew sulky whenever Adara entered the complex. When Leto grew sulky, lights flickered, air circulation grew poor, and Griffin's investigation was hampered in a dozen ways, small and large.

“I don't understand,” Griffin said to Leto one afternoon when Terrell and Adara were both outside. “You don't mind Terrell. Or me.”

“This is a restricted access facility. Although you are not on the list, I can see a rationale for admitting you. You have many of the right qualifications. In any case, I cannot expect you to be included on a list that was made centuries before you were born.”

“And Terrell?”

“Terrell is your bondsman,” Leto said primly. “Although such situations were exceedingly rare, there is precedent for him to be admitted. However, there is no precedent at all for Adara, less than for the great cat. After all, some of the residents of this facility did keep pets. However, under no circumstances were any unbonded savages permitted within—much less permitted to come and go at their own whim. I was in violation of my own dictates when I let her enter. I have since regretted it.”