Journey into the Void (38 page)

“Yes, why?” he asked, startled.

“Just checking,” said Shadamehr, adding gloomily, “I don't know about you, but this is the last time I ever dabble in bad omens.”

They had a small porthole in their cabin. The sunset was spectacular, the sinking sun spreading a trail of blazing purple-orange across the surface of the blue-gold water, but none of the four had the heart to enjoy it. Griffith swept up the shards of the broken bowl and piled them on the table, prepared with his apologies if the orks asked what had happened to it.

The orks did not. The orks did not disturb them. The elves lay on their beds, trying vainly to sleep. Shadamehr—bent double—paced restlessly about the cabin, listening to the creaking of the ship and the shipboard
sounds of running feet, flapping sails, and the chants that accompanied every part of shipboard life. Alise sat and watched him.

“At least,” said Shadamehr, peering out the porthole, “they're not sailing off.”

“True,” said Griffith. “They haven't raised the anchor.”

“That's not such a hopeful sign,” said Alise. “If your theory is correct, the Captain could be waiting for the taan army to show up.”

“You're right,” said Shadamehr somberly. “I'd forgotten that.”

A knock thundered on the door, then a large ork thrust his shaved and tattooed head inside. “Captain says you're wanted for dinner.”

“Not the main course, are we?” Shadamehr asked.

“Naw,” said the ork, grinning. “We got squid!”

At that, Damra, who had risen to her feet, sank back down. “No, thank you. I'm not hungry.”

The ork's grin was gone in a moment. “You will come,” he said. “You will all come. The Captain commands it.”

“At least it's not dried figs,” said Shadamehr in her ear as they walked out.

 

The Captain's quarters were located in the ship's prow and were quite splendid, by orken standards. A large window provided a stunning view of the ocean. The table, made of a slab of wood resting on top of trestles, could accommodate ten orks or fourteen humans. An enormous map of the continent of Loerem and all the surrounding seas hung on a wall. Another map—this one smaller and more detailed, featuring the Blessed Straits, the estuary, Krammes, and Old Vinnengael—was spread out on a desk, anchored in place by various navigational instruments. So interested was Shadamehr with the maps that he had to be persuaded to leave them to take his place at the table.

The Captain of Captains sat at the head of the table, with her guests ranged along either side. Joining them were two other officers. The rest of those in attendance were shamans.

The food had been prepared for orken and human and elven palates, with fried squid and fish chowders for them and a purple soup for the elves. The orks drank ale. The Captain provided wine for the humans and the elves, a treat they had not tasted since they had left New Vinnengael. Orks do not drink wine, considering it a drink suitable only for very young children, and sickly children at that.

Shadamehr accepted the generous mugful the orks poured for him. He tasted it, rolled it on his tongue. The wine was the heady, spiced red wine from southern Dunkar, and it tasted wonderful, especially after weeks of drinking stale water from barrels. He hesitated a moment before drinking, thinking things through. He thought he knew now what was going on. Smiling to himself, he lifted the mug to his lips and drank the spiced wine. He drank it all and asked for more.

Conversation flowed with the wine. The Captain spoke of the political situation in the world. Shadamehr was impressed with her knowledge. He had the feeling he should be uneasy about certain things she said, but the wine was too good to ruin by arguing. She knew about Dagnarus. Shadamehr tried to get some sense of how the Captain felt about him, but she proved noncommittal, with one exception.

“If it had been left up to the orks two hundred years ago,” said the Captain, tearing off a hunk of bread and using it to sop up the remains of her soup, “Dagnarus would not be a problem for you humans.”

“What do you mean?” Shadamehr asked politely, feeling a story coming on.

“When King Tamaros was given the Sovereign Stone, he invited all the representatives of the four races to come to share in it. He held a great ceremony. Our Captain of Captains was invited to it. He didn't know whether to go or not, for the omens were very bad. His shaman assured the Captain that the bad omens were for the humans, not the orks, and so the Captain went. During the ceremony came the worst omen of all for the humans. The young princeling, Dagnarus, was given one of the pieces of the Sovereign Stone to give to his elder brother, Helmos. When he handed the stone to his brother, the stone slipped and cut Helmos, so that he bled.”

The orks were silent—solemn and serious in the presence of such a terrible sign from the gods.

“King Tamaros went on with the ceremony,” the Captain continued. “He could do nothing else, I suppose. The Captain of Captains and the shaman waited around, to be witness to the slaying of the young princeling, for, of course, with blood spilled between brothers, Dagnarus could not be allowed to live. Nothing happened, however, except a party. The Captain wanted very much to return to his ship, and so he asked King Tamaros when he planned to kill the prince, expressing his hope
that it would be before the next tide. He even offered to do it himself, if it would speed up the proceedings. Imagine the Captain's shock when he heard Tamaros say that he had no intention of killing Dagnarus. That it had all been ‘an accident.'”

The shamans shook their heads over the criminal stupidity of humans.

The Captain chewed vigorously on her bread. “Blood spilled between brothers. We were not surprised when war broke out. If Tamaros would have listened to the orks, his kingdom would not now lie in ruins.”

“This calls for another glass of wine,” said Shadamehr. “Change the subject,” he ordered under his breath.

“Is it true, Captain,” said Griffith, “that you have orken shamans who are skilled in all forms of elemental magic?”

The Captain nodded. “It is true.”

“Most orks consider any magic except Water magic an abomination. Yet, you have orks who practice Fire magic and Earth magic.”

“And Void magic,” said the Captain.

“Indeed,” said Griffith uneasily. “Void magic? But you orks despise the Void.”

“Some orks despise elves,” said Captain. “Some elves despise orks. Yet here you are. The Void is the center of the great circle of life. Without nothing, there cannot be something. The Void has its uses,” she added complacently. “As do elves. Or so I am told.”

“More wine,” said Griffith.

Shadamehr poured out the ruby red wine for himself and his friends. He lifted his glass in a salute to the Captain of Captains. Drinking the wine, he listened to the ship's bell ringing the changing of the watch. He looked at Alise, whose red hair glowed like flame in the light of an oil lamp that hung above their heads. The lamp swayed with the gentle rocking of the ship…

The lamp swayed round and round…

The walls swayed round and round…

A cry and a crash.

Alise on the floor. Damra on the floor.

Griffith on his feet, reaching out…

Griffith on the floor.

Round and round. In a circle.

In the center was the Void.

A
LISE AWOKE WITH THE WORST HEADACHE SHE'D EVER EXPERIENCED
in her life. Her head felt as if it had been stuffed with rocks, whose sharp and jagged edges jabbed her painfully when she tried to move. She would not have moved if she'd had a choice. She would much rather have remained still until death took her, which she felt certain would not be long. But beneath the pain and the nausea ran a nagging sense of danger that impelled her to open her eyes and try to lift her head from the pillow.

She groaned and lay back down. Bright sunlight, streaming in through a window, lanced straight to the back of her head. Lying there, trying to understand what was wrong, she finally figured it out.

The bed wasn't moving.

Wincing, she shaded her eyes with her hand, looked about the room. The objects in her vision swam about, and only after intense concentration could she manage to make objects stop wiggling and crawling. Her suspicions were confirmed. The window was a window—it wasn't a porthole. She was in a room with whitewashed walls and nothing much else, except crude beds and a single chair.

An elderly man sat on the chair beside her bed. His beard was clipped and smooth. He wore robes of finely combed wool and he regarded her without expression.

“Rigiswald…” Alise said dazedly. She tried to sit up.

“Take it easy,” Rigiswald counseled. “You've had a rough night. And your day isn't going to be much better, I'm afraid.”

Fear cleared her head.

“Shadamehr!” Alise said thickly. Moving her swollen tongue was difficult. She looked around the room, could not find him. “Where is he? What has—”

“Not here,” said Rigiswald. “He and the elven Dominion Lord are both gone.”

“Griffith?”

“He's here. He's in the next room, sleeping it off.”

Alise looked down at herself—her red hair bedraggled, her dress disheveled and filthy.

“Where are we?” she asked, dazed. “This isn't the ship…”

“No,” said Rigiswald. “You're in Krammes. An inn. The Merry Tippler.”

Alise sat up. “Where is Shadamehr?” she demanded firmly.

“I believe, my dear,” said Rigiswald, “that the orks have both him and the elven woman. I forget her name.”

“Damra,” said Alise. She rose to her feet, lurched unsteadily across the floor, and grabbed hold of the window ledge to steady herself. She stared out to sea. She stared until her eyes ached and the tears streamed down her face.

“The ship…The Captain's ship…”

“Gone,” said Rigiswald crisply. “Sailed off. You should come back to bed. Lie down before you fall down.”

Alise turned away, but she did not go back to her bed. “Tell me what happened. How did you find me? Us?” she amended, remembering Griffith.

“I've been keeping a watch,” Rigiswald replied. “The ork's message stated that the ship was nearing Krammes. I have friends among the orks here and put the word out that I would appreciate being informed when my friends arrived. I gave them descriptions of you and Shadamehr.

“Last night, an ork came to my room about midnight. He said that I should come with him right away. That one of the persons I'd been inquiring about was in trouble. He brought me here, to this establishment. Are you certain you won't sit down?”

“I feel better standing up. I am standing up, right?”

Rigiswald nodded.

“I hoped that was the case. I wish the floor would quit moving,” Alise said.

“You don't have your land legs back yet,” said Rigiswald. “When I arrived, I found four orken sailors. One had you slung over his shoulder. The other was carrying the elf. They were in an argument with the owner of this place that terms itself an ‘inn.' The orks stated that arrangements had been made to leave you and the elf here for the night. Money had been paid out, as I understand it.

“The owner stated that the money wasn't enough. That he ran a respectable business and he didn't want anything to do with ‘drunken hussies.' I should add here that the orks had wrapped a scarf around your friend Griffith's head. With his ears hidden, he makes a rather attractive-looking female.”

“Oh, gods!” Alise groaned. She made a feeble attempt to shove her hair back out of her face and gave up. “I wake up feeling like something that's been run over by a wagon and left to die in an alley, to find you here, Griffith dressed like a woman, and Shadamehr gone.”

Her voice trembled. “I think I will sit down,” she said, and staggered back over to the bed. “What happened after that? Did you question the orks?”

“I did. They claimed that they had met you two in a bar on the water-front. That you had all been having a ‘good time' until you and your friend passed out from too much drink. They were told to bring you here. I asked who told them, who paid the money, and so on and so forth. In answer, they handed me this, said I was to give it to you.”

Reaching into a leather pouch, Rigiswald drew out a ring, held it out to her. The amethyst glittered in the sunlight. Alise took it, her fingers shaking.

“Did they say anything else?” she asked.

“They said the ring belonged to ‘Shadamehr's woman.'” Rigiswald smiled slightly.

A tear slid down Alise's cheek.

“It does,” she said softly, to herself. “It really does.”

She clasped her hand tightly over the ring.

“Where do you think the orks have taken them? To…” She swallowed, trying to force the words past the lump in her throat. “To Dagnarus?”

“I don't know,” said Rigiswald gravely. “But I fear so. Both were carrying portions of the Sovereign Stone, after all.” He patted her hand.
“Still, we must keep up hope. All is not as bleak as it seems. The message they sent you about the ring doesn't sound as if it came from someone with evil intent.”

Alise made another shove at her hair. “I don't know. They knew we had the Sovereign Stones with us. The orks knew who was carrying them, and they've kept those two people. What other reason could there possibly be except to turn them over to Dagnarus?”

Sighing, she sat silently a moment, holding fast to the ring.

“Have you heard from Ulaf? When do you expect him and the others?”

“I haven't heard anything,” Rigiswald replied. “As to when he'll arrive, I have no idea. He was meeting with various Dominion Lords along the way.”

“I don't suppose any of them have shown up here in Krammes?”

“No,” said Rigiswald curtly. “I don't expect them to. I doubt if he found any alive. Dagnarus and his Vrykyl would have seen to that.”

“So, what are we going to do?” Alise asked.

“Move you and the elf to a different inn,” said Rigiswald, casting a disparaging glance about the room.

“And after that?” Alise couldn't help but smile. At least some things in her life remained the same.

“I plan to finish reading my book,” said Rigiswald, unperturbed. “You are the energetic one. You should probably hang about the waterfront, see what information you can pick up among the orks. They won't tell you anything, but at least you'll feel useful.”

“Thank you,” Alise said dryly. She put her hand to her throbbing head. “I can't believe we let them drug us! We should have known. It was so damn obvious. The orks didn't drink the wine. That alone should have tipped us off that something was wrong.”

“Sometimes we pull the wool over our own eyes,” said Rigiswald sententiously.

Alise stared, appalled. “Are you saying that Shadamehr knew he was being drugged and he let it happen? But why?”

Rigiswald didn't answer. He regarded her intently. “Think of the message, my dear.”

“Oh, no!” Alise cried. “He wouldn't. That—That—”

“He knew where he had to go, didn't he?”

“Nonsense! He couldn't have figured all that out,” said Alise with a toss of her head, a move she immediately regretted.

“He knew where he had to go. He knew he alone was responsible for the Stone. He must have been fairly certain that no Dominion Lords would come to Krammes. And he knew that you would be in danger if you came with him. And he also knew that if he tried to insist that you leave him—”

“He knew, he knew, he knew,” said Alise impatiently. “He doesn't know anything. He doesn't know me like he thinks he knows me. He had no right to send me away. I hate him,” she added, sitting up straight and wiping her eyes. “I hate him with every fiber of my being. I have hated him from the first moment I met him. I have hated him in the past and I intend to hate him in the future. He's the most expasperating man in the universe.”

She held the amethyst ring tightly, very tightly.

“And now,” she said, “I'm going to go wake Griffith, and the two of us will set about finding out what has happened…what has happened…”

She stood up or tried to. The room tilted. The floor slid out from beneath her feet. Fully intending to walk to the door, Alise landed facedown on the pillow. She moaned softly. “Oh, Shadamehr, how could you go and get yourself kidnapped by orks.”

“I'll be here when you wake up,” said Rigiswald, pulling another book from his pouch.

“Tell Shadamehr…when you see him…that I hate him,” Alise mumbled, closing her eyes.

“I'll do that,” said Rigiswald.

 

The Captain of Captains sat in the stern of the shore boat, her hand on the tiller, guiding the boat that was slowly, silently crawling up the estuary. The boat's oars had been muffled. The six orken sailors who rowed the boat took care to lower the oars into the water quietly, with only the smallest splash, so that their presence would not be detected. The orks traveled by night, gliding past the fort that had made such a nuisance of itself during their bombardment of Krammes.

The Captain was not particularly worried about being discovered. The omens had been exceptionally good this night, as the omens had
been good all week. She did not count that pitiful attempt at omen-faking performed by the elf. The Captain chuckled every time she thought about the waterspout, forming out of a clear blue sky with not a cloud in it. A goony bird could have seen through that!

Tonight's omens foretold the cloud cover that hid the moon and stars and promised the rain that obliterated the sounds of a boat sneaking underneath the humans' very noses.

And the rain came, dancing across the water in sheets. An ork stood at the prow, staring into the darkness, watching for obstacles in the estuary. The Captain did not expect any. The orks had sailed this estuary in their tall ships for centuries. They had mapped and charted every eddy and snag. The orks rowed with ease, making good time, chanting their rowing chant beneath their breaths, instead of booming it aloud. The Captain's shaman sat nearby. At her feet were two largish lumps, covered in tarps to keep them warm and dry.

One of the lumps began to snore loudly. The shaman glanced at the Captain in concern.

“Turn him over on his stomach,” said the Captain.

The shaman did so, with the result that the snoring ceased.

“Even in his stupor, he holds on to that knapsack,” said the shaman in admiration.

“Yes,” said the Captain, “he does.”

“Is that where he hides the Sovereign Stone?” the shaman asked.

“It is,” said the Captain.

“And the other?”

“She is a Dominion Lord. It will be protected by her armor.”

The shaman nodded his understanding.

“How long will they sleep?” the Captain asked.

“As long as you want, Captain,” the shaman replied. “All I have to do is cast the spell again.”

“Good.” The Captain grunted. “Let them sleep a long time. They will need their rest…where we're going.”

The shaman nodded, and the rest of the night passed in silence as the boat glided unseen up the estuary.