Neb thought about this. “Do you think Renard can help us?”
Aedric shrugged. “I’m not sure what he offers is help.” He nodded to Isaak. “These metal men are a wonder of the world, to be sure, but there was something deadly in that one. something unlike Isaak. It had blood on its hands-I’m sure of that-and no qualms about spilling more.”
Neb did not doubt it. He’d seen the metal beast roar through them in the guard house, seen it leap the stairs three at a time to crest the wall. Certainly, Isaak also had blood upon his hands, yet the regret and remorse of it was obvious in the metal man with his every limping step. He did not feel dangerous, but the one who named him cousin there on the Keeper’s Wall reeked of it. But despite the danger, something more powerful-a curiosity that bordered on need-fueled Neb. He gave name to it. “What about Sanctorum Lux?”
Aedric nodded, slowly. “Aye,” he finally said. “There is that curiosity.” He sighed, looking west toward the Keeper’s Wall, then east where jagged lines of mountains serrated the horizon. Last, he looked back to Isaak and to Neb. “We need to know of it. But I think General Rudolfo would not risk so much treasure to chase down an answer to that question. The venture is ill timed, and we are ill suited for it.”
He means us, Neb realized, though he could not fathom why Rudolfo would place such stock in him. Isaak made complete sense-the metal man carried vast amounts of knowledge within him and was indispensable in their work restoring the library. His absence from the Ninefold Forest for even a month would be felt, but if anything were to happen that he not return, it could slowly bring that light-saving work to a halt. Among the mechoservitors, he was chief and was the only of their kind to understand the principles with which they operated in such a way as to keep them maintained and functioning. And he was. Neb reached the word and finally found it. Special. Different. Of his kind, he’d been the only one to take a name and to take up the Androfrancine robes. At least until this other had shown up, wearing robes and going by the name of Charles, the name of the mechoservitors’ supposed father.
And at one time, Isaak had uttered the words of Xhum Y’Zir, singing down death upon Windwir, transformed into a weapon that could weep for the genocide it was bent and twisted into committing.
It made sense that Rudolfo would not risk Isaak. But what of Neb? He was a boy, a young officer who’d seen too much for his years and yet had seen very little. Winters saw destiny within him-Nebios ben Hebda, the Homeseeker. The one who would eventually become the Marshfolk’s fabled Homefinder, spiriting them off to a promised land beyond their wildest imaginings. But even Neb struggled with the superstitious underpinnings of those beliefs, despite his trust in the Marsh Queen Winters.
Neb forced his mind back to their quiet conversation, licking his dry lips before he spoke. “Still,” he said, “if there is a sanctuary of light-if it is another library as Isaak suspects it may be-”
Aedric interrupted. “Then we will trust that those who hid it here in the Wastes did their work well and that it will await us when we can come to this place with more presence and certainty.” He offered a grim smile. “We have time, lad. And perhaps our guide will bear us happy tidings.”
With a hasty goodnight, Aedric slipped into the barn and pulled the door closed. Neb settled down on his haunches and watched the night move on toward morning.
There was an eerie silence punctuated by the occasional barking of dogs inside the walled town just north of them. Still, even the dogs sounded odd-as if noise here just didn’t behave properly.
He’d always loved last watch during his time in the gravediggers camp-it had proven to be a quiet watch most nights and one less popular with others. But the notion of being up before the morning really began, of seeing the day unfold in such a manner, felt hopeful. Fifteen minutes slipped past, and suddenly a figure emerged silent from the shadows. It was already upon him when he reached for his knives and puckered his lips to whistle Third Alarm.
“Hush now, young Nebios,” Renard whispered in a slurred voice. “You’ll wake your friends without cause.” The gangly scarecrow of a man slipped closer. The smell of alcohol was strong on him, and he staggered a bit while he walked. The man chuckled, then mumbled, “Sounds like your young captain doesn’t have the stomach for the Wastes.”
He’s drunk. But Neb noted the surety of his feet. The long stick was now slung over his shoulder, and he approached with open hands. Neb couldn’t resist the question. “Do you bear news?”
Renard looked up, smiling, and for a moment Neb was no longer certain of his inebriation. There was a cold light in those gray eyes. “I bear more than news,” he said. “I bear a choice.” He took a step closer, and the reek made Neb’s eyes sting. “Remember what your father told you about choices?”
And he did remember. Neb’s mouth fell open in disbelief. Hebda had told him on more than one occasion that a man’s success or failure in life came down simply to making the right choices. He started to say something, but before he could, Renard slipped past him and bent close to Isaak’s head. He whispered something Neb could not hear, and he wasn’t certain even Isaak heard it until he saw the eyes flash suddenly open, as wide as the shutters would let them. When Renard smiled at Neb, his teeth were black with the chewing root. He cast something to the ground near Neb’s foot, but everything happened too fast for him to look.
The Waster whistled Third Alarm and shouted, “Renard betrays us,” in a voice that sounded much like Neb’s own. Pandemonium erupted on the hillside as bright lights and loud booms filled the night air. In the shadows, a horde of figures swarmed. Neb heard scrambling in the barn but still had not drawn his blades. Renard set out south at a run that stretched and stretched until he was lost beyond the dim reach of Neb’s vision.
Isaak looked to Neb. “I’m sorry,” the mechoservitor said.
Then he, too, ran. His metal legs pumped into a run that lurched and wobbled from his limp, but he steadied as he built steam and loped off after Renard.
As Gypsy Scouts spilled from the barn, knives and pouches at hand, Neb looked down to the bit of black root between his feet and made his choice.
Vlad Li Tam
The grating of wood against wood drew Vlad Li Tam to wakefulness and he stirred. In the days-or was it weeks?-he’d lain in tepid saltwater he’d finally retrained his instincts to accommodate captivity. He no longer opened his eyes expecting to see and no longer found himself gripped in panic when he could not. Instead, he came awake quickly and immediately set himself to the task of ciphering his present circumstances.
The girl brought him food with some regularity-usually a pungent gruel that tasted something like fish and corn-but he had no idea how often she came. And each time, she helped him sit up and fed him patiently as if he were a child. Sometimes, she left the bowl if he hadn’t finished. But he had yet to eat from the bowl directly. It was bad enough he took his water that way those times that the rocking of the ship didn’t spill it into the seawater that sloshed about the bottom of his cell.
Vlad Li Tam rolled to the interior of the hull and pressed his ear to it. He heard distant voices and felt the vibration through his skull as the wood scraped together again.
They’d stopped moving, he realized, and the dramatically lessened to-and-fro swaying of the ship told him they were either in unnaturally quiet seas or safely harbored. The latter seemed most likely.
He heard footsteps beyond his door and used the wall to sit up. His muscles protested-cramps and spasms took him, and when the door opened, he heard himself groan.
“Just a short walk,” the girl told him. “We could have you carried, but I thought you might appreciate the restoration of some of your dignity.” There was amusement in her voice.
“Where are we?” he asked.
She did not answer. Instead, with strong hands, she reached down to work at the ropes binding his ankles, and for the briefest moment he flexed his muscles to kick out at her but thought better of it. She chuckled. “You’d not get far, old man. It’s good you didn’t try.”
“If you’d wanted to kill me,” he said, “you already would have.”
She laughed again. “Actually, that’s not true, Vlad. There are other matters to attend to before that day arrives, but do not doubt for a moment that it’s coming.” She pulled at him, and her strength was surprising. “Stand up now.”
He did, wobbling unsteadily before falling against the hull. She pulled him upright, her firm hand steadying him. Then, she guided him ahead of her, her hand on his shoulder. The stale air of the hold felt like cool autumn compared to the fetid room he left. He walked into the corridor.
“To the right now,” she said. “Ten steps to the stairs.”
His legs burned with the effort and he staggered.
She leaned in close behind him, and he felt her breath tickle the back of his ear. “I could have you carried. Would you prefer that? Is that how you want your children to see you?”
My children. He felt panic rise in him, flooding him with a fear and a rage that made his head ache. He clenched his fists and felt his jaw clench. “My children?”
She said nothing. Gently, the woman pushed him forward. “You can face this, Vlad,” she told him. “Walk to it.”
Vlad Li Tam forced himself forward, counted the paces and found the first step with a tentative foot. As he climbed up, light swam at the edges of his blindfold and he suddenly smelled mango trees and salt air and hot sand. He opened his mouth and drank it in. She turned him to the left, and firm hands lifted him onto the dock.
Once he stood on the dock, he felt hands at the back of his head, and he was suddenly blinded by an explosion of white. He closed his eyes against it, and even against his eyelids it penetrated him. He groaned.
When he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was the girl. She was young-maybe twenty-and her face was painted in markings of gray and black and white, her green eyes stark against that backdrop. Bits of seashell and coral and wood were woven into her hair and she smiled at him.
She was beautiful and dangerous.
She wore the garb of a fishing girl, but he could tell it was not her custom. She was made for armor or possibly gowns but nothing in-between. Yet a man on the dock held up a dark robe to her, and she slipped her arms into it.
“Where am I?” he asked again.
Her smile widened. “Home, Vlad.”
As his eyes adjusted, he took in the rest of his surroundings. The schooner at the dock was made of a dark, unfamiliar wood, and the lines of it were nothing he’d seen in the Named Lands. The shipbuilder in him measured it and recorded its displacement, factored its speed based on its mast and sails, and noted the mixed crew that moved over the deck.
The dock was a high structure overlooking water so green and clear that it stung his eyes, and as he looked inland, he saw jungle and sand. Within the jungle, birds sang and monkeys chattered, and above it, a large building of white stone rose up into a cloudless blue sky.
Vlad Li Tam blinked and staggered, but she did not steady him this time. He looked at her and finally made the connection, but it made no sense to him. The paint, drawn in careful symbols upon her skin, and her hair, decorated with pieces of the earth, gave her away though the style of it had more sophistication than he’d seen previously. “You are a Marsher,” he said.
“No,” she answered. “That is the bastard name from the time of our sorrow. But the tears of my people are passed now. I am Machtvolk.”
Machtvolk. He dropped the word into his memory and found nothing to resonate with it.