Ghost in the Pact (13 page)

Caina came to a stop, looking around.

“What is it?” said Annarah, lifting her left hand. Her pyrikon had returned to its bracelet form, but he knew she could return it to the form of a staff in an instant. “Foes?”

“Not presently,” said Caina. She had led them down an alley off the main street, at the very boundary between the harbor district and the Alqaarin Quarter proper. A mixture of warehouses and taverns lined the streets, with many of the taverns doubling as brothels. Caina walked a short way up the alley, staring at one of the taverns. It had begun its life as a squat warehouse, but then someone had added two more floors of rented rooms on the rooftop.

“Are we stopping for a drink?” said Morgant. “Seems strange to do when the fate of kingdoms and empires are in flux.”

“We’re not buying a drink,” said Caina, still contemplating the tavern. “We’re negotiating.”

“With whom?” said Morgant. 

“Captain Murat and his crew,” said Caina. “You’ve met them. Murat is stubborn, and he won’t want to set sail until tomorrow.”

“Perhaps the sound of the drums and the Great Horn will persuade him otherwise,” said Annarah. 

“Perhaps,” agreed Caina. “But Murat’s selfish, not stupid…”

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive,” said Morgant.

Caina kept talking. “He knows about the rebellion, and he’ll assume that the Grand Wazir is marching south to assail the rebels. He knows that has nothing to do with him, and that he’ll get a great deal of money from Nasser if he sails tomorrow. So he’ll stay put. We just have to persuade him to leave early.”

“Unless,” said Morgant, “the sound of the war drums convinced him to abandon us and leave Istarinmul, lest his crew gets press-ganged into the Padishah’s army.”

Caina hesitated. “It’s possible. But I doubt it. Murat will stay put. There’s too much money at stake. We just need to convince him to leave right now.”

“And how are we going to do that?” said Morgant. “Ask nicely? Or you’ll bat your eyelashes at him? I don’t think the Kyracian would approve. Unless you’ve forgotten about him already.”

“Morgant,” said Annarah, her disapproval plain. 

He wanted to see how Caina would react. Her relationship with the Kyracian drove her, but it was also a source of weakness. If she indulged that weakness at the wrong moment, it might get them all killed, and Morgant would be unable to keep his word, which troubled him more than the prospect of death itself. 

Yet Caina did not react, save a brief tightening of a muscle near her left eye. She knew him well enough by now to know his methods. Annoying, that. 

“We convince him to leave early,” said Caina, reaching into her pack, “like this.”

She yanked out a mask, pulling it over her head, and then donned her Ghost shadow-cloak. It seemed to darken the air around her, wrapping around her like a shadow as she drew up the cowl. By some secret the Ghost nightkeepers had learned to wrap silk with shadows, creating the shadow-cloaks. That cloak blended and merged with the shadows, enhancing Caina’s already formidable abilities at stealth. It also shielded her mind from detection spells and thought-controlling sorcery, though since she was now a valikarion, it was hardly necessary. 

And since she was standing in the middle of an alley on a sunlit day, the cloak’s abilities at stealth were useless.

Morgant scoffed. “What, you’re going to ask him as the Balarigar? Murat will just laugh at you and hand you over to the Grand Wazir.”

The bounty on the Balarigar’s head, last Morgant had heard, was still two million bezants. In fact, one of the official decrees was nailed to the door of the tavern. The Grand Wazir had worn out an army of scribes publishing those decrees. Morgant had no doubt that Murat would murder his own mother for a tenth of that sum. 

“Of course not,” said Caina, her voice a muffled from the mask. “Follow me into the common room. Listen to me, and when I run up the stairs to the second floor, wait a few seconds, and then shout that the Balarigar is fleeing to the Alqaarin ship in the harbor. Got that?”

Morgant groaned. “You’re going to do something clever.”

“Hopefully,” said Caina. She took a deep breath, and her voice changed, becoming deeper, raspier, a hissing snarl that matched the shadow-cloak. Morgant had to admit it was an impressive bit of theatricality. “Follow me.” 

She threw open the tavern door, pausing a bit in the entrance. Morgant heard the murmur of surprise from the inside of the tavern, followed by a shocked silence. He looked at Annarah and rolled his eyes, but to his surprise she grinned. Annarah was so honest that she enjoyed Caina’s little ruses more than she should have. 

He sighed and followed Annarah into the tavern.

The common room was crowded. All the porters who would have been unloading ships at the docks and stocking the warehouses had nothing to do, so they came to the taverns and drank. Porters and rowers and sailors, both slave and free, sat the benches and tables. The dockside taverns were egalitarian in their devotion to selling cheap wine to both slave and free alike. Every eye was upon Caina as she strode into the common room, the shadow-cloak flowing around her. Morgant admitted it did look more impressive in the dim light of the common room. 

“I am the Balarigar!” announced Caina in her disguised voice. Her words thundered through the room. “I have slain the vile sorcerer Cassander Nilas, and I call upon the men of Istarinmul to join me as we march upon the Golden Palace and cast Grand Master Callatas from his throne of lies!” 

No one moved.

“Join me,” said Caina, “and together we shall defeat the Grand Master and free Istarinmul from his tyranny.”

Still no one moved. Morgant could read their expressions easily enough, and he could tell every man was thinking the same thing. The Balarigar was here, alone…and the Grand Wazir had put a bounty of two million bezants upon his head. Whoever killed the Balarigar here and now would never have to unload a ship again.

Caina dashed up the stairs, and Morgant shared a look with Annarah. 

“After him!” said Morgant. “He’s fleeing to an Alqaarin ship in the harbor! After him, fools! If we take him, we can split the bounty! After him! Stop him from getting on that ship!”

He ran up the stairs, Annarah following. Morgant saw Caina vanish onto the third floor, and he ran faster. At the third floor, he saw Caina stop in a doorway, beckoning to him, and he and Annarah ran after her, crowding into a cramped bedroom that stank of sweat and worse things. Caina slammed the door and barred it behind them, but before she did, Morgant heard the sound of the mob rousing itself to action. 

“We’re trapped,” said Annarah. “Now what?”

Caina nodded, pulling off her mask and shadow-cloak and shoving them back into her pack. “Morgant. Cut us a door.”

Morgant drew his black dagger, its edge glinting in the dim light coming through the room’s sole window. The rickety walls of the room were built of cheap brick and mortar, and presented no challenge to his enspelled weapon. 

“So why did we enrage the mob?” said Annarah.

“It’s simple,” said Morgant, stabbing the dagger into the brickwork. He dragged the weapon down, carving a glowing line into the bricks. It felt like cutting thick cheese. “We riled up the drunkards and sent them running to the harbor. Along the way, other idlers will see them. No one in the harbor has anything useful to do at the moment. So this mob will head for the
Sandstorm
…”

Annarah laughed. “And Murat will panic and flee the city, since he’ll think they’re coming for the bounty on his head.” 

“That’s the plan,” said Caina.

Morgant made a quick horizontal cut, and then ripped the dagger upward. “Or you could just burn the building down.”

Caina gave him a puzzled frown. “Why would I do that?”

The sound of people running up the stairs came through the door. 

“You enjoy it,” said Morgant, making another cut. “How many buildings have you burned down? The Inferno…”

“That was the Hellfire,” said Caina.

“The Craven’s Tower…”

“Also Hellfire.”

Morgant yanked his dagger free and considered the cuts. “You deliberately set the Shahenshah’s Seat on fire.”

“I do not burn down buildings that often,” said Caina. 

Annarah started to say something and stopped herself.

“I always have a good reason!” said Caina. “It…for the gods’ sake. We can argue about it on the ship. Go!”

Morgant grinned and kicked at the wall. The slab of brick fell outward, disintegrating as it did, leaving them with a short jump to the rooftop of the warehouse below. Morgant went first, helping Annarah down, and then Caina followed, her mask and shadow-cloak secured in her pack once more. Caina led the way, and they ran from rooftop to rooftop towards the harbor, jumping over the narrow alleys between the warehouses. Morgant glanced back towards the tavern, and saw the mob spilling out into the street.

Damned if it wasn’t working! 

They reached the last warehouse before the docks proper, and scrambled down the wall and to the broad street before the piers. It was easy to find the
Sandstorm
, since Captain Murat’s ship was the only one in the harbor. Morgant spotted Murat’s crew going about their tasks on the ship, a motley mixture of Anshani and Istarish sailors, with a few Kyracians and Saddaics here and there. About half of Murat’s crew was Alqaarin, their skin far darker than the bronze shade common among the Istarish and the Anshani. 

Sanjar Murat himself stood at the rail, fanning himself with his elaborate plumed hat. He was a giant of a man, nearly seven feet tall, clad in black boots, black trousers, and an open red coat that displayed an expanse of muscled chest and flat stomach. His dark face was leathery, and his head had been shaved, likely to keep lice at bay, though a close-cropped black beard came to a point below his chin, framing his gleaming white teeth. A leather baldric crossed his chest, holding a row of throwing knives and a sheathed cuirass that hung from his hip. He frowned as they approached, and then a white, sardonic smile crossed his face as they ran to the end of the
Sandstorm
’s pier. 

“Well, well, well,” said Murat in Istarish, his voice heavy with the rolling accents of the Alqaarin sultanates. “Master Ciaran, Master Markaine, and your lovely silver-haired maiden.” He vaulted over the railing and landed upon the pier with easy grace, sweeping out his hat to Annarah in an ostentatious bow. “Have you come to sell her to me?”

Annarah only smiled. “I am a married woman, sir. Such questions are inappropriate.” 

Of course, her husband had been dead for a century and a half. He had burned with her children and the rest of Iramis. Annarah knew that, yet bore up under the grief remarkably well. Perhaps she kept going to fight the grief. 

“Bah,” said Murat. “If your husband wishes to defend your honor, he can show up and fight for it.” He looked at Caina. “And you, Master Ciaran? I suppose Nasser has sent you to carry out his errands. Or do you wish to spend the time by throwing knives at my mast?”

“We can, if you wish,” said Caina, “but you need to set sail at once.” Once again her voice had changed, becoming harsher, gruffer, the voice of a competent mercenary. 

Murat sighed. “As I explained to Nasser, we shall set sail tomorrow. I am taking on supplies and drinking water…”

“Nonsense,” said Caina. “You’re ready to go. You’re too cautious for that. You know there is a price on your head in Istarinmul, and you have your ship ready to flee at the first sign of trouble. You only wanted to stay longer to drive up Nasser’s price.” 

“A slanderous accusation,” said Murat without malice. “Were you a sailor, Master Ciaran, you would recognize that a vessel has needs before she can take to the open waves once again. You are wasting your time. The
Sandstorm
shall sail tomorrow, and not before.”

“I didn’t come here to change your mind,” said Caina. “I came here to save your life. You know what happened in Istarinmul a few days ago?”

Murat shrugged. “The Umbarians tried to destroy the city, or so I understand.”

“They almost succeeded,” said Caina. “The people of the city are desperate and hungry…and you have a bounty of five thousand bezants upon your head. Five thousand bezants will buy a lot of food.”

Murat snorted, but Morgant saw new wariness there. “If bounty hunters come, we shall deal with them.”

“It’s not a bounty hunter,” said Caina. “It’s a mob, hundreds of them. Murat, listen. You need to set off right now. Else they will overwhelm your crew and put the
Sandstorm
to the torch.”

Murat blinked, off-guard. “But…what about Nasser and the others? That sullen Kyracian? Nasser booked passage for all of you.”

“Damn it!” said Caina. “I can carry out our task on Pyramid Isle alone. Either we go now, or we don’t go at all.” She stepped back. “Make up your mind. If you want to stay here, fine. We’ll go hide and watch your ship burn. Decide now.” 

Murat scowled, and then the mob from the tavern started to spill onto the dockside street. The leaders pointed at the
Sandstorm
, and they started running towards the vessel. 

“Murat!” said Caina. “We have to go!”

Caina Amalas, Morgant decided, did indeed know how to drive a hard bargain.

“The Living Flame burn it all,” spat Murat. “Karlazain!” Murat’s first mate, a villainous-looking Saddaic man in ragged clothes, straightened up. “Cast off! Get the rowers to their benches, and get the ship turned around.” He pointed at Caina. “You three, get aboard. We’re leaving. You’re still paying the full price, though.”

“Oh, yes,” said Caina in a quiet voice. “We’ll pay.”

Murat gave her an odd look, but the mob was drawing closer, and they had no choice but to board the ship.

###

A short time later Caina stood on the
Sandstorm
’s stern, watching Istarinmul and the Alqaarin Harbor recede into the distance as the corsair ship plunged into the Alqaarin Sea. They had been well away from the pier by the time the mob arrived, but a few of them had jumped into the water, hoping to catch the Balarigar. A few warning shots from Murat’s crossbowmen changed their minds, and the
Sandstorm
had gotten away clean. The Istarish galley guarding the harbor had started towards them, but Murat’s rowers had not let up, and the Istarish warship had shown no interest in pursuing them.