The Traitor's Heir (11 page)

“It wouldn't do to have her dead before we get there,” he told the cadet. “See that she's kept warm.”

The boy smiled brightly. “Yes, sir,” he said. “Goodnight.”

Eamon nodded and drifted back to the deck and the evening air.

C
HAPTER
V

D
uring the river trip Eamon spent much of his time on deck caught in a waterward vigil. In fact he spent so long there that he began to be an accurate interpreter of the jargon used by the holk's crew.

Hierarchy on the vessel was straightforward: the captain had overall charge of the craft, the sailors answering to him, while the Gauntlet lieutenants had charge of the cadets, ensigns, and prisoner on board. The ship's captain often discussed details of the route to Dunthruik with Eamon and Spencing, though the latter was sparingly polite in his attention to the captain.

As the days went on, Eamon found himself disliking Spencing, and the two ensigns who clung especially to him, more and more. The ensigns had been in the swearing line with Eamon in Edesfield what seemed like years before: Ensign Ilwaine (quiet and reserved) and Ensign Hill (wasp-tongued and agitated). Lieutenant Spencing was arrogant and unamiable, and Eamon couldn't understand why the two ensigns had such an attachment to him.

These three men, and Eamon himself, formed a significant part of the group who would disembark at Dunthruik together and who presumably also comprised the finest of Edesfield's new ensigns and officers.

Eamon kept his distance from Aeryn. Was he not a sworn man? And yet, when he lay in his bunk at night, rocking with the swaying of the
Lark
, he thought that he would have braved the road to hell for a good glance – but Aeryn never deigned to grant him so much as a bad one. All he received from her was, at best, fury, and at worst, indifference.

It left him caught between two equally unpleasant desires. The first was to somehow rescue Aeryn and free her before they reached Dunthruik. Once they arrived the Hands would be her escort, and though he could protect her from cadets and ensigns, he could not protect her from them.

His other desire, which grew stronger as the days passed, was to simply do what was asked of him: take Aeryn to Dunthruik and hand her over. Whispers in his mind told him that once in the city he might be made a Hand himself as a reward and come into the confidences of the Master. From there his power would be unlimited. Then Aeryn would beg for his help.

Was that what he wanted?

During his first day on board Eamon had watched the changing landscape and grown increasingly uncomfortable as the hills and valleys that he knew became thick, forbidding forests. The brooding trees huddled darkly along the distant banks, full of ghostly shimmers in the moonless night.

It was those woods and banks that made it an unexpected comfort to share the small quarter with Spencing. Since Eamon had taken responsibility for the prisoner, Spencing had never spoken a kind word to him. Still, in the dead of night with the cold gnawing at him and shadowy fears creeping along the hull, Eamon was glad to hear the breathing of another soul, even one as detestable as Spencing's.

One thing that Eamon did enjoy was drilling the cadets and ensigns. There wasn't much room on the deck, so the
Lark
stopped for several hours every day to allow the Gauntlet to drill on their own turf. Though there was nothing special about most of the lads, Eamon didn't see in them any lack of enthusiasm or any reason why they should have been sent down the River to have their heads cleared. Once he and his charge had been deposited at Dunthruik most of them would be going straight back to Edesfield to continue training, and perhaps some of them would be posted out to the borders. Despite the sour words with which Spencing often treated them, the cadets and ensigns did not hesitate to spar or do one more lap of the banks with a double-weighted pack. They were determined young men and the thought of even one lapel pin struck fire into their eyes.

During the drill on the second morning, while the crew was taking water on board, Eamon observed the cadets finish their exercises. His thoughts were far away – so much so that he didn't see one of the cadets approaching him until the boy was drawing himself up for a smart salute.

“Sir!”

Eamon looked up to see the beaming face of the young man whom he had first met in the swearing line. It made him feel old.

“Cadet,” he acknowledged. The cadets and ensigns had been dismissed and were returning to the holk. Eamon was acutely aware of Spencing and his ensign lackeys laughing unpleasantly, most likely at him, just
over
their breath.

The boy did not seem to notice. “I know it isn't really my place, sir.” He held out his hand; in it was a small golden fruit, still wet with dew. “But I wanted to give you this.”

Eamon looked at it, dumbly. Then, at the cadet's urging, he took it. The fruit gleamed in his palm like cool fire.

He looked back at the young man in astonishment.

“We wondered if you might appreciate a change to the ship's rations, sir.”

Eamon resisted the urge to raise his eyebrows in surprise.

He realized that other cadets were watching his exchange with the boy. “Is this gesture on your initiative, cadet?” he asked.

“Mostly mine, sir,” the young man confessed. “And I wanted to thank you for offering to help me at Belaal's office the other day. I'm sorry I didn't get to thank you at the time. But I can now. It was good of you, sir.”

“It was no trouble,” Eamon told him, glancing at the fruit. He was touched by the boy's kindness; kindness he had not felt since he had sworn. Had the throned already taken so much from him?

Service to the Master was worth any price.

“What's your name, cadet?”

“Cadet Mathaiah Grahaven, sir.”

“And is this the kind of gesture that granted you a place on this ship, Cadet Grahaven?”

The boy grinned. “Honestly, sir, I think it was tearing the college's divisional banner on swearing day.”

“You tore the college banner?” Eamon laughed.

“Only a little, sir,” the cadet answered. “It slipped when I was hanging it; came clean off the pole, sir.”

“Is it possible for a ‘little' tear to bring a banner clean off its pole?”

“Lieutenant Kentigern said something of that ilk, sir. He also assured me that Captain Belaal had no stomach for my breed of carelessness. He was right about that, sir,” he added wistfully.

“I trust that you are finding yourself less careless since you began this voyage, Mr Grahaven?”

The boy nodded. “I am, sir,” he said eagerly.

Eamon looked at the fruit. “Thank you, Mr Grahaven, to you and your fellows,” he said. “I will endeavour to pull no further faces at lunch or, at the very least, to pull them where you and your colleagues cannot see them.”

Cadet Grahaven smiled. “Yes, sir.”

Saluting again, the boy hurried off to join the watching cadets. He was evidently just in time to catch a good joke; they began roaring with laughter.

“Keep yourselves together!” Spencing barked as the boys boarded.

Eamon watched them leadenly. He realized that he had seen the young man on many other occasions at the college: Cadet Grahaven had joined the Gauntlet a year after Eamon himself, though was perhaps as much as four or five years younger. In a couple of months, Mathaiah Grahaven would be sworn.

Spencing interrupted his thought. The lieutenant slid up to him and snatched the fruit.

“Taking bribes, are we, Mr Goodman? Or maybe,” he added with a leer, “accepting favours? Well, each to his own!”

Eamon glared. He was struggling to find a suitable retort and Spencing knew it.

Laughing at his hesitance, the lieutenant held the captured fruit up to the sunlight, admiring it. “As for me,” he said, “your charge is a creature much more to my liking…”

“You will not touch her,” Eamon growled.

Spencing smiled. “I wouldn't dream of it, Mr Goodman,” he said, pressing the fruit back into Eamon's hand. The skin burst and flesh and juice smeared everywhere, including down the front of Eamon's jacket.

“I am so sorry!” Spencing cried in an ingratiating manner. “Let me help you with that, Mr Goodman.” Before Eamon could stop him Spencing had mockingly smeared sticky mess across his uniform. Eamon seized his wrist.

“Sir?”

Hill was a few paces away; the ensign watched the two lieutenants uncertainly.

“The captain says we're ready to loose moorings.”

Spencing's eyes never left Eamon's face. “Thank you, ensign.”

With a smile, Spencing primly pulled his wrist free and then straightened Eamon's jacket.

“One must lead by example, Mr Goodman,” he said.

That night, despite the gentle rocking of the holk, Eamon couldn't sleep. It made him irritable and as his irritation grew so, it seemed, did the volume of the creaking beams, the snoring sleepers in the iron hold, and the occasional call over deck. As he tossed over onto his other side with a grimace, he realized that sleeping in a hammock was well when one had spent the morning stringing it between two trees with one's father and all the sleeping that needed to be done was that of a lazy afternoon. Sleeping in holks' hammocks was as far removed from his fond childhood memories as it was possible to be.

Spencing's smug and heavy breathing only served to fuel his frustrations at being the only one on board awake. Goaded, he swung his legs over the edge of his hammock. He resolutely pulled on his boots, tucked in his shirt, and tugged his jacket on over the top, grateful that the dark would hide the stain which neither he nor anyone else had been able to remove completely. Then he escaped into the moving air of the passage.

He welcomed the rush of cold that met him as he left the hold. At the top of the deck stairs he saw stars passing in and out between the clouds, and shadows tilting with the mood of the lanterns.

Slowly, his steps turned towards where his prisoner lay bound.

He approached the two soldiers on duty. One of them was Grahaven. Behind him, in a pile of sacks serving as bedding, lay Aeryn, covered with two thick cloaks. A chain led from her ankle to one of the walls and a discarded bowl of water was not far from her head. Eamon knew that she often refused food from his guards, though she drank readily enough.

Aeryn began to toss and turn violently. Half-uttered cries left her lips and she raised her hands to her head. Eamon was startled.

“Nightmares, maybe,” Grahaven whispered to him, clearly shaken by the spectacle.

“Sure proof of treachery,” hissed the other cadet.

Eamon stared at him. Did the cadet know Aeryn? Had he grown up with her and laughed with her as Eamon had? Had he studied with her and played with her, shared her myriad joys and sorrows over long years?

“Hold your tongue, Stonebrake,” Eamon snapped.

Suddenly Aeryn screamed. Without a moment to consider what he was doing Eamon rushed to kneel beside her.

“Wake up!” he said firmly, remembering just in time not to say her name. He could not give the cadets any reason to question him or his authority. “It's just a dream. Wake up!” Catching her in his arms as she tossed, he shook her hard.

Her eyes snapped open. Her brow was wet.

“Eamon?” she whispered, shaking so that the name was almost lost.

“It was just a dream,” he told her.

For a few seconds she allowed herself to be comforted by him. Then, with the suddenness of returning memory, she sat bolt upright and tore herself away.

“Get away from me!” she cried. “All of you!”

Reeling, she grabbed the bowl of water and hurled it at him. He raised his arm to his face in time to shield it. Seconds later he was drenched, and shards of broken earthenware were scattered all around him.

“Sir!” Grahaven called.

Stonebrake drew a slim dagger – the hold's ceiling was too low for his sword – and advanced with menace.

“Vile snake!”

Eamon rose, gesturing the cadets to stand aside. Grahaven stopped at once; his companion took a little more convincing.

“Put it away, Stonebrake,” Eamon told him. He concealed the ripple of rage in his voice. “I have not been hurt and she must not be.” He turned back to Aeryn. “You slept ill and I sought to wake you,” he said coolly. “I bid you goodnight.”

With that he turned and left the cabin, conscious of three sets of eyes staring after him.

He returned to his hammock to sleep badly for the rest of the night and was late up in the morning. When he finally appeared on deck, rubbing at sore eyes, the ship's captain greeted him with a grin.

“When the cat's away,” he jibed in his thick, kindly accent, one garnered from a lifetime of living on the docks and the water. “What would Captain Belaal say if he caught you sleeping past first drill?”

“Drill's done?” Eamon asked blearily.

“Mr Spencing handled it, so I understand.”

Eamon grimaced. At the captain's suggestion he visited the ship's cook for a mug of something warm.

When he had finished the dense, porridge-like drink he was given, he went ashore to assist in what remained of the morning exercises. Spencing and Hill made their insincere good-mornings. Ilwaine said nothing at all.

Eamon led his cadets through a harsh weapons drill. When Aeryn was brought on deck for her daily walk, he quietly delegated supervision of her and the cadets with her to Ensign Ilwaine; he had no wish to see her.

Later that afternoon, his duties done and the cadets all occupied in cleaning weapons or swabbing decks, Eamon retreated to his haunt at the stern. The cook – a ship's doctor by trade – had distributed an unusually pungent gruel at lunch. This now made its presence felt rather disagreeably in Eamon's miserable insides. With no stomach even for the fresh bread they had brought on board from their call at Greystream that morning, Eamon passed his time in breaking the bread into pieces and hurling it into the churning wake of the ship. Someone should enjoy it, after all. Every now and then a fish, swerving along in the holk's shadow, found its way to a crumbling morsel and swallowed it up with glee.