Tilda turned to Phin, and to his surprise she hugged him as well.
“You saved all of us, Phin,” she said, stepping back and smiling at him. “That’s why I’ve decided not to kick you in the belly for knocking me out with a sleep spell.”
“Obliged,” Phin said.
“Duchess Perforce,” Heggenauer said solemnly, standing up next to his chair. He bowed from the waist.
“Really?” Claudja asked. “I have to curtsy in these trousers?”
“Not necessary, your Grace. I only wish to say that I have arranged for you to meet with the Codian Grand Duke of Doon, as you wished. He shall await your convenience in the First Fort on the old Pirate Cove, anytime after the noon hour.”
“Heggenauer, thank you,” Claudja said with such deep earnestness that Phin wished he had gotten up early and arranged such a meeting himself, not that he had any idea of how he would have done so.
“What’s all that about?” Zeb asked, and Tilda gave him a look. He shrugged. “What? It’s a secret?”
Claudja looked around at the others, and seemed to reach a decision. She took a breath.
“I have come to the Empire on behalf of my father, Duke Cyril Perforce of Chengdea. The Emperor must be informed posthaste that our Duchy, and all the prominent citizens therein, are prepared to make formal acceptance of the Code of Beoshore. We petition his Imperial Majesty for assistance in our time of travail.”
Everyone stared, Phin and Heggenauer even more stunned than the others as they were both Codians born.
“You wish help against Ayzantium, your Grace?” Heggenauer asked.
“And against the Kingdom of Daul,” Claudja said. “This news will anger the King on the River Throne greatly when it is known, which is why I traveled in secret. Or rather, why I tried to do so.”
The Duchess looked around at everyone again, and reached out to squeeze Phin and Tilda’s hands.
“I am telling all of you this now, only so that you may know how profoundly I mean my thanks. For getting me this far.”
“I so should have charged you more,” Tilda said, and Claudja grinned at her.
“I would have gone much higher, were you a better barterer.”
The two of them laughed and hugged again, and cheers went up from the table as the doors behind the bar were pushed open by people bringing food from the kitchen, platters of eggs and great bowls of thick Soutermese sausage, spiced with Agintan pepper and wild chives. The party ate, together, and for an hour the thoughts of what came next for each of them were held at bay. It seemed that whatever was to come, it surely must be better than what had gone before.
*
The Ayzantine vessel sailed at first light so Nesha-tari left Souterm without returning to the inn, saying goodbye to no one but the Westerners and Zebulon. She did however stand in the stern as the ship left the docks, looking back at the skyline she had first seen little more than a month ago, though it already seemed much longer. She felt no Hunger as of yet, and so was unconcerned by the ship’s crewmen around her. Neither did they leer at Nesha-tari any more than they would have at any other woman.
She had completed the task given to her by Akroya successfully, slaying Horayachus and keeping the Red Priest’s plans for the Duchess of Chengdea from coming to fruition. Nesha-tari still had no idea if the second thing had really been of any interest to the Blue Dragon, but she could not imagine he would have a problem with it. She had been bidden to sail to Roseille to meet with others in Akroya’s service after the task, and from there she thought surely she would be allowed to return home. Back to the high desert desolation of the Hakalya, and back to the life she had known now for more than a century. She had been waiting for that return since the moment she came down from the desert, and though she was moving toward it now Nesha-tari was still looking back, away from her future.
The servants of Blue Akroya were a contentious lot, and their cut-throat rivalry for the Dragon’s favor often became literal. They were the only people Nesha-tari had ever known in her life, not counting prey, and they were her most dangerous enemies. There was not one among them who Nesha-tari could even tenuously consider a friend.
Though Nesha-tari knew it was ridiculous for her to think of any of the people she was now leaving in that way either, she felt something like melancholy as Souterm receded in her sight. Amatesu and Uriako Shikashe had been her companions for months, and the shukenja had told the others their terrible story to demonstrate that they were not so different than was Nesha-tari herself. Little better, and perhaps even worse. The Jobian Kendall Heggenauer, despite his initial revulsion, had put himself between Nesha-tari and Balan, even as the Devil Lord was exposing her for what she truly was. Despite seeing her true form the party had stayed with her, and taken her with them when they escaped Vod’Adia.
That, to Nesha-tari, seemed to be the sort of thing that friends would do, though she had never had any personal experience with the phenomenon. She was half Lamia and half human, but only the first had ever been of any value to her, or to the Blue Master to whom her mother had sold her, long ago.
Nesha-tari was leaving what might have been a different kind of life had things been much different, but somewhere within her she knew that it was a kind of life she could only consider at a time like this, while she was not Hungry. She thought about it for those moments all the same, and she did not leave the stern railing until the city of Souterm had disappeared around a bend of the river, the waters carrying her back toward home and the thing that she could not help being.
*
Black Danavod returned to Vod’Adia with the setting sun, skimming low over swamp and hill on her great wings. She dropped into the valley on the southern side, away from the Camp Town. The Great Dragon shivered as she broke through the cloudy veil, for even a creature of her colossal power was not immune to the sheer magnitude of the magic that had once been worked in the dark city, the Cataclysm that for a time had severed the place from this world and ringed it in occluding fog.
As she passed through the veil, Danavod thought she could almost sense that it was slightly weaker than it had been this morning, though that may have been her imagination. It was probably too early to feel it, though she knew it was happening.
Danavod beat her wings and pulled up her snout as she came in low over the city, swerving around towers. She did not roar this time as she was not in the mood. She pulled up sharply before the palace, rising high above it on a level with the pointed roofs of the nine subsidiary towers, then settling back toward the familiar courtyard within one connecting wing.
Balan awaited her there, ringed by several of his little spiky minions who all winked away before Danavod settled to a landing on her hind legs, leaving the Devil Lord alone. Danavod folded her wings and planted her forelegs, sitting cat-like in the courtyard directly before Balan, who bowed.
“Your Humongousness,” he called. Danavod’s head loomed high above him at the end of her long neck.
“Balan,” Danavod’s disembodied voice purred out in the gathering gloom.
“I hear the monkeys got away. Rough, that.”
“Nesha-tari told me the Circle Wizard did nothing at the Node,” Danavod said. “Yet he was allowed to reach that place.”
“Well, I don’t know that allowed is really the word…” Balan said.
“Did you arrange for the Wizard to come unto the Node, Balan?”
The devil winced and scratched the back of his neck.
“Yes I did.”
Danavod flicked out a single claw, a casual gesture that laid the devil’s abdomen open almost to his spine. Balan screamed and collapsed on his seat. Spiney devils began to pop into existence all around, while larger Bearded ones pounded out from the halls giving into the courtyard.
“Shall I kill all your minions as well, Balan?” Danavod called.