You play a dangerous game.
In Claeon’s head, the voice of the octopus-king was like stones grinding and rattling in the far, cold depths. Normally it was the human mind that opened the channels of Art-Speech, but Arkeuthys had seen human generations come and go, and understood their minds better than they did themselves.
‘Because I must,’ Claeon whispered, knowing that Arkeuthys would feel his thoughts, read his lips, draw his meaning out despite membrane and water.
These prisoners…
‘Are safe.’
Are you not concerned that you have gone too far?
‘I got where I am by taking risks. You know that.’
Word about the land-kinden is across the city already.
Claeon frowned. ‘How is that possible? I took every precaution-’
You left your own men and the Nauarch’s men alive as witnesses, and you humans do love to talk. Probably there is not one of you who does not now speculate about the Edmir’s new prisoners. You had best make quick use of them.
Claeon nodded. ‘You were absolutely sure of your prey, were you?’
Two of them were leaders, the third merely an annoyance.
The Edmir stared into the horizontal slash that was Arkeuthys’s pupil. ‘And how would you know a land-kinden leader?’
I can tell a leader of men by the way that he stands, the leaden voice of the octopus ground out the words.
Claeon’s expression soured a little, wondering if some criticism was meant there. Did he, Claeon, stand like a leader of men? Arkeuthys was silent on that point, and to ask would be to show weakness. ‘We shall see what we can squeeze from them that I can then feed to Rosander.’ He grinned suddenly, teeth glinting amid his dark beard. ‘What of you? Do you, too, not speculate about the fabled land-kinden?’
What are they to me, or to my kind? Less than nothing, came Arkeuthys’s reply. The huge body bunched itself about the frame of Claeon’s window. There is trouble coming, Edmir. I sense the currents shift. Do not be unready.
Then the enormous length of the great octopus was spiralling away, surging off into the open water, casting a many-limbed blot over the peaceful and pastoral seascape.
One of his people came to him shortly after, bowing low and waiting to be acknowledged. She was Sepia-kinden, her pale skin currently set with a spray of red-brown freckles that pulsed slightly as she breathed. Claeon regarded her proprietorially: one of his more decorative servants, and possessing a keen mind for her kind – or at least keen enough to want to keep her master happy.
‘What do you bring me?’ He stood with the great sea-window at his back, and beyond it the midnight reaches of his domain.
‘An envoy from the Littoralists awaits your pleasure. It is Pellectes, Your Eminence,’ she announced, keeping her eyes modestly lowered. Like all the Sepia-kinden she was slight of build, her body rounded and soft, her nature, he supposed, as passionate and expressive as they were claimed to be. He could not immediately recall her name, but that was surely secondary, as was the fact that she had proved herself a fair majordomo since he appointed her three moons ago. She had lasted longer than all of the last three officials put together. Mind you, Claeon had been going through an impatient phase, just before her appointment, and he was a man intolerant of small failures. After all, why spend so much in gaining the Edmiracy, to let fools balk me still?
And speaking of fools… ‘The Littoralists can wait until the coral grows over them,’ he snapped, seeing her skin flush in points and swirls of blue and green at his sharp tone. Pellectes would want the land-kinden handed directly over to him, of course, but Claeon did not need the Littoralists as much as he once did. One necessary evil that is now losing its necessity. And he had only one response to unnecessary evils.
‘Send some of my guards to fetch me a spokesman from the prisoners. I will see how these creatures dance,’ he directed his majordomo. Haelyn was her name, he now recalled. He would have to detain her, after she had passed on his orders. It would not be the first time, and she would be glad of it, or at least wise enough not to show any different. It would set him in the right frame of mind for torturing a land-kinden.
‘Your fault?’ Stenwold asked, trying to discern more of the woman Paladrya in this poor light.
‘I am in no position to make amends,’ she said, her voice halting, tentative. ‘Grant me one wish, though, land-kinden. Tell me, is he well?’
This was so unexpected that not even Teornis had an answer for her. When the silence stretched out, she begged them, ‘Please, tell me, is he hurt? He… he cannot be dead, surely?’ There was a ragged edge to her tone now.
‘Lady, we do not know of whom you speak,’ Teornis told her gently.
‘But surely he must have sent you…?’ She trailed off. ‘If you do not follow Aradocles then why are you here?’
‘A very fair question, but the answer lies below the waves and not above it,’ the Spider replied.
‘We were snatched from our ship by your sea monster,’ Stenwold explained, unable to keep a shudder from his voice. Even to think of that moment, the creature’s arm coiled about his leg, the sudden lurch, the waters closing over his head…
‘But I see this is not some prison made especially for landsmen, then,’ Teornis intervened brightly. ‘You are a native yourself, I perceive. Are the sea-kinden so very law-abiding that you are their one criminal? What are your circumstances, that you must endure our company?’
Stenwold could make her out more clearly now. She looked very pale against the surrounding gloom, the sallow lights catching her skin. Like all the sea-people she wore very little, just a kilt and a cloth pulled about her breasts. Her appearance was gaunt, and the way she held herself showed a woman hurt and vulnerable.
‘This is the Edmir’s own oubliette,’ she pronounced. ‘These spaces are reserved for those valuable enough to keep, and too dangerous to ever let loose. I am here because I am a traitor to the Edmir, and yet
… and yet he has not steeled himself to kill me.’
‘This Edmir, he’s your lord, is he? The ruler of this place?’ Teornis pressed, and Stenwold had to strain to see her nod. The Spider continued, ‘And what is this place? What is it called? If it is no cave, then what is it?’
‘This is the colony of Hermatyre,’ she told them, obviously considering the words self-explanatory.
‘A town?’ Teornis asked and, when she did not respond, ‘There are many people in this colony of yours?’
‘Oh, thousands,’ she told them. ‘Hermatyre is the largest of all the colonies, and that’s not counting the Benthist trains.’
‘Well, who’d count them?’ said Teornis drily, still chipping away at his bafflement. ‘Excuse us for these questions, but we find ourselves strangers and prisoners in a very hostile place, and you are the first person who has had pleasant words for us.’
‘Why are you to blame for us being here?’ broke in Stenwold, perhaps impoliticly. ‘Or do you take that back now, now that we are none of your… Aradoces, or whatever the name is.’
‘I am to blame,’ she confirmed sadly. ‘It was I who turned the Edmir’s eyes towards the land. I have endangered not only you but all your kinden…’ She stopped fearfully, and at that point Stenwold heard movement above. Before his eyes, Paladrya faded, her pale skin greying until, lost in the dimness, she had blended with the stone around her. What good can it do her, he wondered, since she is still in her cell? He guessed this hiding Art was pure reflex, her last attempt at defence, slipping beneath the notice of her captors so as to escape one more beating, or worse.