Blood Storm: The Books of Blood and Iron (28 page)

“You were going after the power of the shape long before I got involved,” the harbormaster pointed out.

“Another lie. We only truly decided to find the power of shape after Aisa learned about Ynara.” Danr closed both his eyes for a moment in sorrow, and Aisa’s own eyes were downcast. “Before then, we might have gone or might not. We never did ask how the Obsidia captured a mermaid. They didn’t— You did, Harbormaster. Once Sharlee found out that Aisa was drawn to the merfolk, you gave them Ynara and helped them set up the auction that lured us to their house.”

“I don’t need to listen to the mouthings of a half-blood piece of—”

“I’m human now,” Danr said. The moment the words left his mouth, the captain’s face turned to stone, and the anvil settled onto his back again. “The only thing I don’t see is why you would offer
us
the end of slavery in exchange for the power of the—oh. Oh!”

“What is it now?” the harbormaster scoffed. “A surprise twist to the end of your story?”

“You
were
telling the truth,” Danr said. “You really are afraid of how much power it’ll give the Obisida. You really do want to stop them from abusing the power.”

“Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons,” Aisa said quietly.

“How is this wrong?” the harbormaster suddenly burst
out. “What is wrong with anything I have done? Bring my plan to fruition and everyone wins! You”—he pointed at Aisa—“despise slavery as inhuman. Go along with this, and slavery will indeed end, and we will instead have an army of workers who don’t think or feel pain or get tired. Our economy will change with almost no damage. And you”—he pointed to Danr—“hate being the center of attention. You brought back the power of the shape, and your fame will soon evaporate. Do you
want
the Obsidia to have this power?”

“Vik, no,” said Danr truthfully.

“Everyone has won!” the harbormaster said. “I should be praised, not pilloried!”

“Except,” Aisa said, stepping forward, “that this plan makes you the single most powerful person in the world. You are already the most powerful priest in Balsia. The golem monopoly will make you the wealthiest man alive. And the power of the shape will put the might of a hundred armies at your disposal.”

“So I gain a little something for my trouble,” the harbormaster said. “Is that wrong?”

“Did you intend to share this power with the crown?” Karsten asked. “The power of the shape?”

“Don’t lie.” Danr tapped his left eye. “I can see it.”

The harbormaster started to answer, then glanced at Danr and folded his lips.

“I see.” Karsten glanced at Danr as well. “That’s an interesting power you have, Danr, your ability to see truth. None of the stories mention it.”

“I’ve kept it quiet,” Danr muttered.

“Maybe you should be a judge,” Karsten said. “Anyway, I don’t think we’ll allow your plan to come about, Harbormaster.”

The harbormaster looked genuinely shocked. “Why in Ashkame’s name not?”

“It’s treason, or did you forget what happens when you plot against the crown?” Karsten said grimly. “Men, take the harbormaster—”

The harbormaster moved so fast Danr didn’t quite understand what was happening. A knife leaped into the man’s hand and he slashed at Danr. Danr automatically grabbed the harbormaster’s wrist to yank the weapon away. Not long ago, the harbormaster would have had no chance, but Danr’s new shape was far weaker. The harbormaster’s knife fell, and red-hot pain sliced Danr’s chest. Blood spattered the deck. Aisa shouted.

The deck bristled with sudden weapons. The prince’s guards, the blue-clad acolytes, and Greenstone’s sailors all produced swords, knives, and truncheons, but none of them seemed to know who they should fight. Captain Greenstone jumped in and grabbed the harbormaster easily enough. The knife spun away. Danr went to his knees, clutching his bleeding chest. He was so weak! The harbormaster was grinning in Captain Greenstone’s bear hug while warm blood ran down Danr’s arm. More of his blood dripped down Willem’s face.

“The poor half-blood. It’ll make me rich.” The harbormaster laughed and licked a scarlet drop from his cheek. His body glowed with golden light. Startled, Greenstone released him, and the men on the deck took a step back. The harbormaster’s shape lengthened. He grew taller, thinner. His features, already handsome, sharpened into preternatural beauty. His hair changed from white to silver, and the tips of his ears poked through.

“Half-blood!” Danr said. His chest hurt like hell, and he felt stupid for letting the harbormaster get the better of him. “You’re a half-blood. Human and elf.”

“You would have seen it if you had thought big enough,” the harbormaster said. “My father would be pleased. And . . .” He stretched out his arms. His sleeves fell back, now too short. “Now I can feel it. I always had a little of the glamour and none of the Twist, but now I can feel both. Thank Bosha!”

“You hated half-bloods, including yourself,” Danr spat. “So you hid.”

“I’m not half-blood now, you Stane moron,” the harbormaster spat back. “I am Fae!”

“Men!” Karsten barked. “Take him!”

The soldiers, none too happy to see a hostile elf in their midst, turned their iron swords toward the harbormaster, who blanched.

“You don’t have me yet,” he said, and with a flicker Danr recognized from countless Twists with Ranadar, the harbormaster vanished.

A moment of silence followed. Then Greenstone said, “Hidden in plain sight.”

“That was . . . frightening,” Karsten breathed. “And incredible! Will your blood let anyone do that?”

“It only works for a few people, my lord,” said Danr. “Some feel horrible pain from it before they change. Some die.”

“You looked at him with that true eye,” Karsten said. “Why didn’t you see he was a half-blood?”

“I . . . don’t know,” Danr said, surprised. His chest still hurt. Droplets of blood spattered the deck. “I didn’t see Aisa was a half-blood, either, so maybe a true eye doesn’t tell you that.”

“The bigger question,” Aisa said, “is what delightful plan will the harbormaster drop on us next?”

“We need to find him,” the prince said. He raised his voice. “Men! I want the harbormaster arrested! Occupy the
temple of Bosha. Find out if they’re making golems. Meanwhile, detain these men for questioning in the Gold Keep!”

The guards on deck turned their swords toward the acolytes, who were just now recovering from the surprise of seeing their high priest transform into an elf and Twist away. The acolytes, who matched the soldiers man for man, snapped their own weapons to readiness. Danr realized he was staring at the sharp, shiny beginning of a civil war. Karsten, meanwhile, at last seemed to notice that while his ship was only a few dozen yards away, a number of priestly blades were pointed at his heart. The sailors on the deck backed up several steps and folded their arms. Karsten shot them a glance, then looked at Captain Greenstone. She shrugged massive shoulders.

“Five gold hands,” Karsten said to her.

“Up the prince!” Greenstone boomed.

Knives and cutlasses leaped into the sailors’ hands. The priests’ blades wavered. Danr tensed. He’d seen more than enough fighting in his life, and every swing of a sword put Aisa in danger. Before the sailors and soldiers could react further, however, the acolytes all leaped overboard and, lithe as porpoises, swam toward the harbormaster’s ship. Karsten watched them go, mouth set.

“Will the harbormaster’s ship try to smack us around?” Greenstone asked.

“Not without the harbormaster himself to give the order,” Karsten said grimly, and turned to one of his men. “But they’re getting away, and they know what’s going on. Lieutenant, I want you and the men to row to shore and take my commands to the Gold Keep. I want the harbormaster found and arrested.”

“My lord,” Aisa said, “if a former slave could offer some advice?”

The prince looked at her and seemed to see her and her
beauty for the first time. He straightened his tunic. Danr suppressed a growl. Karsten said, “Advice?”

“It will take time for your orders to reach the Gold Keep, and then it will take more time for the guard to assemble men and carry out your orders. But I would guess that the harbormaster is already at the temple, giving thrilling commands to his loyal acolytes. If he now has the full elven glamour, his people will be breathtakingly eager to obey him.”

Karsten folded his arms. “What are you saying?”

“Prepare for a long fight. That temple is a fortress, and they are readying for war even as we speak. The harbormaster has stolen our magic to commit treason, and such men do not seek mere money.”

“You think he wants the crown,” Karsten said flatly.

“Along with the head that holds it up,” Aisa returned. “Can you stop him from taking both?”

“We’ll take his filthy life,” the lieutenant said, heading for the longboat. “You can’t trust a shape-shifter.”

He said the word exactly the way other people said
half-blood.
A chill crawled across Danr’s skin.

Karsten didn’t seem to notice. “Lieutenant, I’m going with you.” He climbed down the side of the ship, and the men followed, including the two who were guarding Talfi’s room. Danr heard measured footsteps thudding up from below. The golem!

“Aisa,” he urged, “very soon the Obsidia are going to find out that something went wrong. We have to get to their house soon or they’ll kill Ranadar and Kalessa. Can you change into a mermaid again?”

“Easily.”

“Then we’ll need another longboat and a small favor from you, Captain.”

“Oh, a
small
favor,” Greenstone groused. “Just as long
as it’s
small.
The prince didn’t even pay me the hands he promised.”

“You’ll like this favor, and that’s the truth.”

He spoke quickly as Talfi scrambled out of a hatchway with hair disheveled and eyes wild. He rushed over as the golem thumped up the ladder behind him. “What’s—”

Danr clapped a small hand over his mouth. “Don’t ask. Not yet. Captain, the boat.”

When they climbed down the rope ladder into the craft, the golem started to follow.

“How about a stroll across the bottom?” Greenstone asked. With that, she heaved once, and the heavy golem splashed into the water. It sank in a blizzard of bubbles as thunder rumbled in the distance.

“What did you do that for?” Talfi gasped.

“So we could hurry,” said Danr.

•   •   •

With a flick, Willem appeared atop one of the tall, domed towers within the temple of Bosha. There was a bad moment when his boots skittered on the smooth stone of the dome and he nearly slid over the edge, but at the last moment and with Bosha’s grace, he managed to grab the spire at the top. He stood for a moment, catching his breath and slowing his heart, while the chill, wet breeze pushed at his hair. The storm was coming.

And he was an elf.

Since no one was around to see, Willem allowed himself a moment of giddy elation. He shouted and he thumped his feet against the dome. How
grand
it felt to be freed of the human pollution, to no longer be a half-blood. The childish inner part of him wanted to see the look on Father’s face as he, Willem, strode into the
house—through the
front
door—and claimed a place at the table as a son. Maybe he would Twist to Otrania right now and—

His face hardened. No. He had sworn he would never again set foot in Otrania, or any part of Alfhame. He smiled. Not unless he was bringing order to the place. No more family fights. No more children crying in corners. No fathers who refused half-blood offspring because there would
be
no half-blood offspring. Everyone would know his and her proper place.

The temple of Bosha, azure beneath the gathering clouds, spread beneath Willem’s boots in sharp, tidy perfection. Tiny people moved about like blue and white shards while the gardens, laid out by Willem himself, kept to their rigid rows. Beyond the temple walls sprawled the city of Balsia, a fat and lazy wyrm wrapped around a gleaming jewel. There wasn’t a part of it that Willem didn’t know. The counting houses in the Diamond District, the weavers at the Tenner River, and the dyers at the Niner, the whorehouses near the Docks and in the Rookery, the desperate souls in the Sludge near the Shallows, the cooks ringing Old City—everything in its place. From up here, it looked unspoiled, perfect. Exhilaration made his elven chest thrum. This was to be a god!

Blasphemy. His grip on the spire wobbled. For a sickening moment, the world bobbled beneath him. Then he caught his balance again, and a few moments’ scrambling got him under control. Control. That was the key. Keep it controlled.

The trouble was, control came harder and harder to maintain. The new prince made rash, hotheaded decisions. Hector and Sharlee Obsidia, fond as he was of them, let their obsession with power run them into the mouth of a wyrm. They didn’t understand that Willem had a harbor
to
run, a city to oversee. Until now it had been relatively easy. Willem had used what little glamour he had to keep the old prince under a heavy thumb, and the mayor was barely worth bothering about, but now . . . now everything was getting away from him. The new prince resisted his weak, half-blood power. He allowed the Stane into the city so they could quite literally undermine it. He had brought the so-called Hero of the Twist into the very heart of the palace and listened to his demands. Despite all Willem’s subtle attempts to interfere, Sharlee and Hector were inches away from getting their hands on the power of the shape.

Initially, Willem had been positive the power of the shape would involve an object, most likely the legendary knife used in the sacrifice. All the books pointed toward it. But the books had been wrong. The knife only spilled the blood, the true source of the power. He had planned to take the power for himself, rid himself of his half-blood status, destroy the prince’s army, and then parcel out the power to selected humans who had fallen under his newly powerful elven glamour. Unfortunately, that didn’t seem possible now, or even feasible. Danr and Aisa were already escaping into the city, and Bosha only knew how many people they had already infected with their half-blood magic. His plan was a chaotic wreck.