Found what he was looking for, in miniscule amounts, woven into the fabric of the bladder’s interior in tiny pockets, like quilting. Like what Pelkaia’d done to Ripka’s jacket so she’d always know where she was.
Detan didn’t hesitate. He flared his anger, directed it into those tiny pockets. Heard a whoosh and a cry and a gasp. Aella – for who else could it be? – clapped for joy.
“Well done,” she cooed as she yanked the bag off his head. He looked around, blinking, came up out of his meditative stupor to discover his legs cramped, his head pounding, his feet two clumps of tingling, limp meat. A great maw of hunger crooned in his belly, and his mouth was thick with dryness.
Forge and Clink eyed him like a rockviper that’d suddenly reared up and started hissing. They held their intact globes gingerly, away from their bodies as if that’d do any good at all. In one corner of the room, a smear of soot marred the wall, charred fragments of leather curling on the ground.
“How long?” he asked, and had to stop to cough and lick some moisture into his lips.
“Only seven marks.” Aella beamed, proud. “Impressive for a first try.”
Seven marks. When Aella’d first dragged him into this room for his daily testing his belly had been warm with breakfast and his eyes dry against the rising sun. That sun was gone, now. Hidden behind the curve of the world for a mark or two at least. Gingerly, he unfolded his legs and winced as the blood flowed back to his feet. Felt like he’d stomped all over a cactus, but at least he could still feel something.
“Did he do that?” Clink demanded, thrusting a finger at the fiery smear.
Detan forced himself to crawl to wobbly feet. Misol was beside him in an instant, propping him up. He almost laughed. Couldn’t let the merchandise get any more damaged than required.
“I did that,” he confirmed, watching her eyes widen and her nostrils flare.
“Sweet skies,” Forge murmured.
Detan drew himself up and turned to Aella. “Feed them. Shelter them here, in the yellowhouse. They’ve earned that much.”
“Yes, yes,” she said, waving a dismissive hand. “Skies know we have the room. And I’ll need them close at hand for further testing. I wonder if we could shave a mark off your time on the next attempt.”
He winced at the thought. Seven marks. Seven long marks sitting on that floor in nothing but his pants and his sweat, huddled up under that sack on his head and thinking, thinking. It had felt like only moments to him. He’d have been surprised to hear it’d been a single mark, let alone seven. How could he ever become effectual, and safe, if it took him so long to master himself, to gain control? A man who takes seven marks to fire an arrow at his enemy is a dead man.
“Problem with that,” Misol said. “A letter came for you around mark four, Miss Ward. I looked to see how urgent it was, and figured it could wait until this was finished, but you’d better see for yourself.”
Misol passed Aella an envelope with a broken wax seal Detan recognized as Thratia’s. His stomach dropped. Nothing Thratia had to say to Aella could be any good. The girl’s eyes flicked over the missive, a faint tension thinned her lips. With a sigh she snapped the paper shut, propped her hands on her hips, and set a heavy glare on Detan. He met her gaze, calm and easy. After seven marks rooting around in his own head, that girl didn’t much disturb him any more. He’d seen darker things.
“Thratia requests the Lord Honding’s presence in Aransa. In all haste.”
“For what purpose?” he asked.
She rolled her bony shoulders. “No idea. But I jump when called, don’t I? Misol, pack up, we leave in the morning.”
Misol eyed Forge and Clink. “And these two?”
“Oh. Bring them along. Why not? I suppose we can get some work done along the way. And pick out whoever you need to help you handle the lot.”
“Yes, Miss Ward.”
Detan swallowed. He’d seen darker things than Aella’s glare, that was true, but a whole lot of them had to do with Thratia Ganal.
Chapter Four
Ripka gawped. Couldn’t help herself. All these years she’d come to know Tibal, and his last name had never been mentioned – not once. She’d assumed the lack a simple refusal on Tibal’s part to acknowledge his patronage, and hadn’t dug much deeper. She knew his past had been fraught with violence and hunger, known that even though he’d been press-ganged into joining the Fleet, he’d welcomed the steady meal schedule. And then he’d left, he’d retired from Fleet work and returned to his hometown where he’d worked on airships and any other old thing he could fix up until Detan had strolled along.
Not once. Not once in all their back-and-forth had either Detan or Tibal let slip that Tibal was a Honding himself. Pits below, but Tibal had often ribbed Detan for being of noble blood. Did Detan know?
Pelkaia went quiet, staring at Tibal like she’d plucked a flower and found an angry spider inside. It wasn’t that Pelkaia feared Tibal, Ripka wasn’t fool enough to think that. No, she knew real well what had to be running through Pelkaia’s mind, and it wasn’t pretty. She would be wondering, as Ripka was, just how close those familial ties were. Tibal had once told Ripka he and Detan had tempers like two pieces of a puzzle, similar in strength but different in expression – complements to each other, and it was too hard to tell which was more dangerous. She’d never seen him reach for selium, never seen him manipulate it, but that was no guarantee he didn’t know how.
“Name’s Tibal,” he said slowly. “And I did what you asked of me. Not my fault your nephew’s a man who can’t ever tell what’s good for him. Ran off to join Thratia, he did. Bent knee right down before Thratia’s pits-cursed whitecoat and damned near kissed her slippers. You want to know where your nephew is? You send a letter along to Thratia, I’m sure she’d be delighted to let you know how well they’re all getting along now. But I don’t want to hear it, understand? Detan’s his own man. He’s made that clear enough.”
“You lost him.” Tibal was too wound up to see it, but there was such profound sadness in Dame Honding’s voice, lurking just there at the edges, simmering below the surface, that Ripka’s heart actually ached for the spear of a woman.
“He lost his own self. You need me for anything that matters, Dame, you know where I’ll be.”
“Your mother–”
Tibal raised a hand to cut her off. “You’re a woman of your word, Dame. I know you won’t let an old woman starve because her bastard son lost someone else’s.”
“That is not what I meant,” she snapped. Whatever stoop age had lent to her back disappeared as she straightened up, and Ripka had the distinct impression that she was shouldering the weight of the crest carved into the wall behind her. “Your mother vouched for your heritage, and your father has not disowned you, absent though he may have been. If you have lost my heir, then you are next in line.”
“You want to stick that brand on me, Dame, you’re gonna have to find a whole battalion willing to hold me down.”
Tibal stomped off like he owned the place, took a turn he obviously knew well and disappeared down another hallway. Ripka choked on questions, sorted them, and realized she’d have to wait to deal with Tibal. Nouli was on board the Larkspur, awaiting permission to set up shop here, and Ripka was his advocate.
Into the silence that stretched behind Tibal’s leaving, she said, “Dame, forgive me, but I believe Detan sacrificed his freedom to Thratia.”