Shadow Road Page 7

  There were a nerve-racking few seconds when the Angpixen collided with the Stryka's side. She heeled hard to leeward, and the impact sent everyone stumbling while the Ang's armored hull ripped a deep gouge through the warship's naked ribs. Then she pulled free, leaving the Stryka's bulk rocking heavily in the water.

  And then it was over. The surviving pirates still on the Angpixen reluctantly surrendered. After a few more minutes even the vile language NaVarre and his men hurled after us had died away, replaced by the soft boom of the waves thrumming against the Ang's prow and the snap of the wind in her sails.

  The captain gave the wheel a deft twirl and the Angpixen stopped canting so hard to the left, settling gracefully into a north-western course.

  I climbed slowly up the last few rungs of the ladder and stepped out into the rosy glow of a dying sunset, hardly daring to believe what had just happened.

  Down on the main deck, the rest of the survivors had come up from below, apparently freed from the hold, and most of them were cheering and laughing.

  Against all odds, we, who had survived the impossible not once, not twice, but three times, were going home.

  I was going to see Aunt Sapphine again.

  Without Father.

  12. Things Fall Apart

  17th of Uirra

  I found a way to disguise myself. I simply erased my own existence. It wasn't even very hard. All I had to do was become another traumatized woman in a group of traumatized women; more specifically, a woman whose name was not Brenorra Warring.

  The real Indaria Westerby, publicly known as Lady Pynnewoder, Duchess of Therne, would have died of apoplexy if she knew her given name had been stolen by a lowly Guildman's daughter. She would have then died of the plague, red fever, and scurvy in that order if she found out it was the same Guildman's daughter who stole all her underthings and threatened to mail them to the boys at Havenwood.

  I had never experienced such overwhelming guilt in my life.

  Not for using Pester-Westerby's name. She deserved it, but after going over and over the events of the past month, I had begun to think – no, to believe – that these women might not have lost everything if my father had not been aboard the Galvania. Whatever dark secrets those papers contained, if those secrets could be assumed to be real, then these women had lost a loved one for it. None of them had come aboard the Galvania alone. Every last one of them was mourning someone, and there I was, hiding among them while a nasty, cold little voice kept insisting that if my father hadn't been on that ship – if I hadn't been on that ship – none of this would have happened.

  And still I said nothing. I hid and kept my mouth shut. Even my grief felt hollow. Shallow. It was too convenient. If I hesitated too long before answering a question, I could blame it on grief. And because I could blame it on grief, hopefully no one would realize that I told a huge, whopping great lie to a captain of the Coalition Navy, and behind my blank stare I was scrambling to keep all my facts straight.

  Now, a reasonable person might have asked, "Why would you lie to a Captain of the Coalition Navy?" And they would have a point. After all, he was supposed to protect and defend us all from the likes of Bloody NaVarre. I should have been able to trust him.

  Well, this morning, during breakfast, all the civilians were informed that there would be a debriefing. We were to line up single file facing the doorway to the mess and take our turn answering questions. That didn't sound so bad. Neither did the first question the captain asked: "Name?"

  But then, see, he asked if we knew or had met an Arrix Warring.

  If the butcher's wife hadn't mentioned to the next person in line how odd it was that the captain wanted to know about a particular person, things might have gone very differently. I might not have lied, for instance. I might have thrown myself on the captain's mercy and begged to be taken home, even if I had been on the Galvania illegally. Up until that point, I believed I would be treated fairly if I confessed.

  Except that as the butcher's wife walked away, Teg called after her, "Hey! Why's he asking about this fellow named Warring? What's he done?" and there it went, that familiar slither of apprehension curdling in my middle, that sickening up-tick in my heartbeat.

  I couldn't give my own personal details. That would only connect me to my father. If I was connected to my father, I would be connected to those dratted papers, and if I was connected to those dratted papers, someone might try to make me tell where I put them. If I told anyone where I put them, they might give them to the wrong people... No. Lying might get me clapped in irons for stowing away, but I would have gladly taken that over being identified as Brenorra Warring.

  After the dazzling performance I gave, I was fairly sure the captain only thought I was daft.

  When it was my turn, I sat down in the folding chair in front of his desk, fully aware that I was staring at him like a haddock in a barrel, while once again trying to come up with something, anything other than the truth. This time, though, I couldn't simply refuse to answer. This time I was giving information for a government record. If I wanted to avoid being imprisoned or questioned in depth immediately, I had to say something, and make it believable.

  The captain didn't look up from his papers at first. "Name?" He prodded when I only fidgeted with a fold of my skirt.

  For some reason the only name that came to mind that wasn't 'Brenorra Warring' was "Indaria Westerby," and once her name came out of my mouth, everything began going sideways.

  A hot blush stole over my face as I rattled off made-up details a digit or two different from my own, while mentally kicking myself for not remembering the false name my father had come up with. I couldn't though. Not for the life of me. All my brain would produce was Indaria, and then it was too late, and I was holding my breath while the captain studied me for a beat too long.

  His eyes were a most unnerving shade of pale, winter-sky grey, and he looked out of them with keen focus, as if he could read the fine print on a person's very soul. I had to resist the urge to squirm, sure that he could see straight through all my lies.

  But then he wrote my brand-new name in his logbook and asked in a rich Northlander brogue, "Do you have family we can contact when we reach Lordstown?"

  I licked my lips. "Yes. My... um, my aunt. Rosephyra Daguerre?" I winced inwardly, but it was already said, and all I could do was pray like mad that he had never read a Ladesky novella.

  The captain watched me for another too-long moment, and I gave him a thin smile. Then I nearly sagged out of the folding chair when he jotted that absurd answer in the space for "Next of Kin." It seemed the captain was unaware that as of the last episode, the purely fictional Ms. Daguerre was languishing in the Troll King's prison somewhere in the very imaginary Ma-Pang jungle.

  Captain Arramy sat back, then, his deep voice quiet as he asked, "Can you tell me what you remember of the Galvania?"

  I went still. Even knowing ahead of time that this was part of the interview, I wasn't prepared for the weight of that question. It hit hard, and it only got worse. I took a breath and let it out slowly. Examined my hands. Tried to find some sort of solid ground as my stomach twisted, and memories of burning oil on ink-dark water dragged me in. I had to swallow hard before sound would come out of my mouth.

  "Um," I managed, then cleared my throat and tried again. "It um... it happened so fast." I paused to swallow again, barely able to speak. "I was asleep. Then the ship was tilting, and the safety lights came on, and the steward was telling everyone to 'leave it and go, leave it and go.' So I did. I don't..." I stopped, silently trying to work out a way to avoid mentioning my father. "I don't know what happened to my... um... my traveling companion. We were separated."

  "Was there smoke?" the captain asked.

  I frowned and shook my head. "No. Not at first. I don't remember seeing any until later, when the compression engine blew. Um..." I fell silent, gathering my thoughts. "There was a huge hole in the side of the ship. Like something had exploded outward through
the hull."

  The captain took instant note of that. "Did you hear an explosion?"

  I had already relived that a million times, so I was able to answer steadily enough. "I don't recall one, but it was well after midnight and like I said, I was sleeping. There must have been one, though. The whole ship tilted to port first, then started... ah... started s-sinking to starboard."

  The captain continued eyeing me. "Where was this hole, exactly?"

  "Low on the forward starboard side. A good bit of it was below the water line. I don't know how big it really was, all I saw was the part that came up out of the water as the ship rolled." I swallowed hard, my voice gone thready.

  The sound of pen scratching over paper continued as the captain recorded my words in an efficient scrawl. "How do you know it was an outward explosion?" he asked abruptly.

  I blinked. "Because all the edges were pointed... outward."

  "You said there wasn't any smoke until later," he went on, squinting at his own handwriting. "When the compression engine blew."

  "Yes. That's right," I whispered. My panic was rapidly giving way to exhaustion. I didn't want to keep thinking about that night. Or explosions. Or water, or fire.

  "You're sure?" His brows drew together into a thoroughly intimidating frown as he stopped scribbling.

  I lifted my chin, making myself meet that chilly gaze even though I wanted to shrink between the slats of the folding chair and hide in the floor. I almost preferred facing NaVarre with all his glittery, dangerous charm. Captain Arramy could make the Troll King run for cover with that stare. "Yes. I'm sure," I got out.

  The captain's eyes narrowed. "Do you remember ever meeting a man named Arrix Warring while you were on the Galvania?"

  My pulse skipped a beat, and a swift jolt of pain shot through me. There it was, proof that I was in well over my depth. Like a traitor, I made myself shake my head and say, "I don't think so."

  I couldn't keep the tears from gathering in my eyes. What had Father done? Should I even be protecting him?

  The captain simply looked at me. Then he ended the interview, waving to the next person in line, his tone brusque. "Thank you for your time, Miss Westerby. That will be all. Next."

  I got up and shuffled out of the mess, making way for Mrs. Turragan as she came in.

  ~~~

  So, I became Indaria Westerby today, completely unrelated to the name Warring, wholly distanced from the chaos swirling around my father.

  Therein lay the conundrum.

  In my haste to become unrelated to myself by throwing away my father and everything I loved, I had succeeded in making it impossible to ask Captain Arramy for my father's personal effects. To have any real claim on them, I would have had to manufacture a relationship to myself again, which was exactly what I was trying to steer clear of in the first place, since I had absolutely no idea who to trust now that the captain was also suspect.

  Teg's question buzzed at the back of my mind, now, too, stinging like a bee. "What's he done?"

  To make the whole mess even more of a cat-in-a-birdcage, as soon as we returned to civilization, the price of my lies would only go up. How was I going to get home if I wasn't me? And what in blazes was I supposed to tell the Port Authority agents when they wanted to know why Brenorra Warring wasn't on the Galvania passenger manifest, and I gave the captain a name other than Lorelda Larkham? (I conveniently remembered that tidbit as soon as I walked out of the mess.)

  That was going to land me in all sorts of trouble.

  But that wasn't even the worst part. Even if I somehow figured out how to be my father's next of kin, getting his things back wouldn't do any good. The papers weren't in the satchel anymore.

  No.

  I hid the papers.

  That was the crazy, idiotic idea I had when NaVarre left me alone in his cabin.

  And try as I might, I couldn't think of any reasonable explanation for why I would hide a binder of some stranger's random collection of shipping documents in NaVarre's cabin. "It seemed a good idea at the time" just sounded ridiculous, even to me.

  I resolved to look on the bright side: by happy accident, NaVarre didn't have the papers either.

  It was sorely tempting to pretend the papers had been lost forever. If anyone found them, it was quite likely they wouldn't have any idea what they were. If not for the fact that someone was willing to kill people because of those papers, I would have simply let them disappear, and let whatever my father had done disappear with them. But I knew about the papers. So did NaVarre. Possibly Captain Arramy. That was at least two too many people. I didn't know how many others knew, either. All I knew was that if I did nothing and more people got hurt... No. I had to get those papers back, even if all I did was destroy them.

  Remarkably, the biggest hurdle in this heap of manure wasn't that I didn't have easy access to the papers. It was the fact that we were heading straight for Lordstown.

  After all of that expert marksmanship, NaVarre hadn't actually sunk the Stryka. He sank a decoy: an about-to-be-retired warship stripped down to nothing to give it speed, then painted to look like the Stryka. Arramy and a small, handpicked group of marines weren't even on it when NaVarre blew it to pieces.

  Apparently, NaVarre had pulled that hiding-in-the-sunset stunt already, and Arramy anticipated that he would do it again, which meant Arramy could guess exactly where NaVarre would have to be to do it. He and his marines put the faux-Stryka on a course to intersect, tied down the rudder and set the sails, then dropped a low-cut skiff and let the warship tow them on a hundred-yard line. When NaVarre began firing, they started winching themselves in, using the bulk of the floundering Stryka as cover. While NaVarre was busy boarding the fake Stryka, leaving only a small complement behind to guard the Angpixen, Arramy and his marines were making the short, but deadly-cold swim around to the far side of the Ang, where they scaled the hull.

  Meanwhile, the real, fully functional Stryka was sitting just over the horizon, with Arramy's commander at the helm. A few hours after Arramy stole the Ang, the commander swooped in to drag NaVarre and his men out of the water.

  The Stryka caught up with us a few hours ago, and the captain might as well have handed his crew the moon. The reward for capturing NaVarre alive was apparently big enough that all of them would get a sizeable chunk of money. Capturing the Angpixen meant they would be rich as kings once they finished their service to the Coalition. They merrily tethered up and began hauling their catch to the nearest Naval post.

  All I could think was that a whole day had gone by, and I was no closer to getting Father's papers. Sailing for Lordstown meant I barely had three days left to pull off a retrieval mission before Arramy turned the entire Ang over to the Navy, and I wound up in prison for traveling under falsified documents.

  In the words of Aunt Sapphine, things had gone "bloody well sidelong."

  ~~~

  "Cat-in-a-birdcage": A colloquial phrase that comes from a cautionary fable – a cat saw a bird in a birdcage and somehow got itself into the cage to eat the bird. The cat, being much too big for the cage, could not then get back out, and was still stuck inside the cage when his master returned. When used in reference to a person, this phrase suggests that said person has pursued what they want and gotten it, but in the process they have made a trap for themselves that they cannot get out of without help. Situationally, it refers to an inescapable and ridiculous problem you have created for yourself while seeking to accomplish something else.

  13. Playing Games

  20th of Uirra

  The captain announced a Revel this evening and gave the men a 'deck leave.' Scores of brightly painted lanterns were found in the Angpixen's hold, and they were brought out and strung between the masts, bathing the deck in a lovely multi-colored glow. Someone broke out a tin pipe and a sollenskreik, and there was music and dancing on the main deck. Even the refugees were given a sloshing-full pint of NaVarre's ale, and a few of them even joined in the dancing.

  I stood
back, drinking my pint slowly at the railing while pretending a passing interest in Orrul and Lorren as they stomped and clapped their way through a lively passant. I wasn't really paying any attention, though.

  Teg came ambling over to ask if I would like to dance, but I shook my head. I was in a perfect position to observe the quarterdeck, and I didn't want to miss something.

  Teg mumbled, "Maybe some other time, then," and I nodded, faintly glad when he gave a small bob and went in search of someone more interesting.

  My stomach was in knots. I was hoping I could find a moment when no one was looking and slip up the stairs and across to the map room door... but the quarterdeck was far too busy, and I was beginning to realize this was going to take quite a lot more work than I thought.

  Three days later

  Two more days passed.

  The next morning, I sketched in my journal on the main deck, while really keeping track of the routines of every man who went up the quarterdeck stairs. How long he was up there. When he came back. Who he replaced.

  After an entire day of surreptitious note-taking and counting and timing of rotations, I came to the conclusion that the acting First Mate was able to be in two places at once, there were far too many Midshipmen to be useful, and Captain Arramy's chief delight was standing up on the aft deck at all hours, glaring down upon us like a silver-eyed gargoyle. Blast the man.

  By the end of that second day, however, I had discovered a tiny window of opportunity when the lieutenant on night watch went up to the aft deck to relieve the Midshipman on duty. He seemed to be a creature of habit, this lieutenant. Just as he had the night before, he took the right-hand set of stairs, ducked left, and talked to the helmsman and the Midshipman for a few minutes. The lieutenant was also an entertaining fellow, apparently, because the three of them started laughing, and the Midshipman lingered, which meant no one was on the stairs for about five seconds.

  On both nights, the captain was at dinner when that happened.