City in the Sky (15 page)

“You escorted the cargo here?” the man asked without preamble.

“Yes, sir,” Erik replied. “That is Captain Demond's policy.”

“So I see, Sergeant…” the man trailed off, leaving Erik a space to fill.

“Tarverro, sir,” Erik gave him. “We didn't really expect someone to try and steal lumber, but it's better safe than sorry.”

“Indeed, Sergeant,” the merchant agreed. “My name is Harrin Dolst. If you're prepared to wait a few moments, the payment is ready, and it makes more sense for you to escort it back now than return later, doesn't it?”

Erik inclined his head. “Of course, Master Dolst.”

The merchant quickly returned with a small chest. “The agreed upon price,” he told Erik, “plus a fifty mark payment for the escort.”

“That's not necessary, sir,” Erik told him, quite truthfully.

“Nevertheless, it's been added,” Dolst told him. “It would be
such
an effort to count it back out again, so save me the effort and take it, eh?” he finished with a wink.

Erik shrugged and nodded. “If you insist, sir.”

“Oh, I do, I do,” Dolst replied. “Pass my regards onto Captain Rakeus, Lord Tarverro.”

Erik, who was turning to leave, snapped back around to meet the merchant's gaze as the man gave him the courtesy title due a high-ranking member of the
epti
. All Dolst did was grin at him, and gesture him on his way.

Returning to the ship with a chest containing the better part of a thousand gold coins made Erik far more nervous than traveling out with twenty tons of wood had. He had two of the men sling their shields and carry the chest, and surrounded them with a wall of ready shields.

They made it through the main city without incident, however, and Erik began to relax. As they approached the dock, a beggar hailed them, asking for a coin. Erik eyed the man, noting that he was missing an arm.

Checking his men to be sure he wouldn't be missed, Erik chose to give in to his charitable impulse. He crossed the street and took several small silver coins from his purse.

“Here, friend,” he told the beggar, dropping the coins into the man's bowl. “Get yourself a room and a hot meal.”

The beggar looked up at him and nodded quickly. “Thank you, sir, thank you,” he said, his voice hoarse.

Erik nodded and turned away from the man, half-embarrassed by the man's grateful response to his small gift. He was halfway to his men when a hoarse shout rang out from behind him.

“Look out!” The beggar's shout reacted directly with Erik's instincts and he dove to the ground, barely dodging the crossbow bolt that shot through where his chest had been and skittered across the cobblestones.

Erik surged back to his feet, his shield unslung and sword half-drawn, searching for any further attack. None came, and he turned to the beggar to thank the man.

The man was gone, which wasn't surprising. He'd done more than Erik could have expected in warning him. He slowly resheathed his sword and looked up at Enviers as the corporal approached him, holding the bolt in his hand.

“Jest the one shot, sir,” Ennie told him. “But see the head?”

Erik did. The steel of the tip was discolored, a dull bluish color. “What is it?”

“I can't be rightly sure,” the corporal admitted, “but…”

“It's poison,” Tolars said flatly, eyeing the bolt sitting on the table. “Heartsbane is the name of the stuff, though I've no idea where it comes from. You can find it almost anywhere if you know where to look and who to speak to.”

“How bad is it?” Erik asked.

“Bad,” the platoon sergeant said, looking up at the Lieutenant who sat silently at the other side of the table. “A crossbow bolt would probably manage to nick you, even through that fancy sky steel mail of yours.”

“And just a nick would have killed you,” Albiers said flatly. “I saw it once, a long time ago.” He didn't elaborate.

“It wasn't a robbery attempt,” Erik said questioningly. “They wouldn't have shot at just me, and wouldn't have fled after one shot.”

“No, the pattern is wrong,” Tolars agreed. “So tell me, Tarverro, who'd you piss off badly enough to want to kill you the last time you were in Seije?”

“Nobody,” Erik protested.

Albiers raised his hand, forestalling any further comments. “Tolars isn't implying anything, Tarverro, he's just playing fun.” He glared at the platoon sergeant. “Not everyone is in the mood for your humor Jola after they've been shot at.”

“Sorry sir,” Tolars replied. “Sorry, Sergeant,” he repeated to Erik, who realized that Jola must be the platoon sergeant's first name.

“For whatever reason, somebody just took a shot at you with a poisoned arrow, Tarverro,” Albiers said quietly. “I don't know why, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to suggest that you stay aboard ship while we're in Seije.”

“No complaint from me,” Erik replied. “What about the bolt?”

“Tolars?” Albiers asked.

“I'll take it ashore with me and burn it,” the platoon sergeant replied. “Only way I know of to deal with this crap.”

“Only way I know of as well,” Albiers admitted. “Do it.” He turned to Erik. “Tarverro…”

“I'll stay on the ship, don't worry,” Erik promised. “I
like
breathing, thanks.”

“Good. I don't need the death of one of my sergeants on my hands, let alone a bloody
septon
,” Albiers told him.

When Brane exited his office that evening, he found Korian sitting at the table in the antechamber, a crossbow lying on the table in front of him. The junior agent, only recently initiated into the ranks of the Red Dragon cult, looked annoyed.

“Well?” Brane demanded.

“Someone spotted me as I took the shot,” Korian admitted, disgruntled. “He had just enough warning to dodge.”

The Red Dragon captain nodded slowly. He'd suspected as much. The agent had failed, so he'd been unwilling to come in and tell Brane, but he knew Brane needed to know, so he'd procrastinated out here until Brane arrived. Harmless, if rather annoying.

“Complete failure?” he asked, quietly. Korian was junior, new, and young. Overly harsh criticism could do a great deal of damage.

“Complete,” the agent said flatly. “I used heartsbane, so even a
touch
should have done it, but I didn't even get that.”

“What's done is done, Korian,” Brane told him. “You did well in spotting him.”

The agent nodded slightly, accepting the slight reduction of his failure. Brane eyed him for a moment then decided with a jerk of his head.

“Since you know which ship he's on, try and find its schedule,” the captain ordered. “If he comes off the ship again, tell us, and we'll arrange a warmer welcome for him.”

Korian inclined his head and vanished. Brane looked up from where the youth had been sitting and found Dairn standing against the wall.

“If I'd failed like that, you'd have ripped my head off,” Dairn observed.

“
You
are a veteran agent with over a dozen kills behind you,” Brane told him. “Korian was initiated a bare year ago, and has only been given kill orders twice – he succeeded quite well the first time and coming down on him hard would have ruined the potential.”

Dairn shrugged. “Do you really think Tarverro'll come off the ship?” he asked.

“He should,” Brane replied. “He has duties, and he'll want his shore leave. He doesn't know we're hunting him, so he has no reason to expect a repeat.” The Red Dragon captain paused, examining the crossbow sitting on the table. “We rushed the attack this time, as he was headed back aboard ship. Next time, we won't be so foolish.”

After spending their remaining two days in Seije cooped up aboard the ship, Erik wasn't so sure that it had been a good idea. Nonetheless, he kept his promise and stayed aboard, taking the time to hone his skill with his new bow, which was still almost entirely unfamiliar to him.

Finally, on the third day, the last of the thousand or so tons of grain they were loading here had come aboard, and the
Cloudrunner
lifted off from the reservoir. The sky ship followed the Seije Aqueduct south to the Selt River, then turned west along the river, headed to Yun, the second city of the Kingdom of Ell.

On the second day out of Seije, Albiers called a sergeants' meeting, just before the first of their evening exercises. He gave no reason for it until all eight of the ship's noncoms were settled into his office, watching him expectantly.

“Gentlemen, thank you for coming,” he told them. Coming early to the exercises had meant that First Platoon's sergeants, who had afternoon exercises that day, had had to eat quickly. “However, there is an issue we need to raise.

“As you all know by now, Sergeant Tarverro was attacked in Seije,” he said grimly. “While I would like to presume that this was due to some action of his in his previous time in the city, that appears unlikely. Which means whoever attacked him either had sufficient reach to know that he was on this ship and where it was going, or was generally attacking this ship.”

Erik grimaced. He'd been trying not to really think about the implications of the attack, as they were grim. Either someone with a long arm was hunting
him
, specifically, or someone with a somewhat shorter arm was hunting people of this ship.

“In either case, it's
possible
that we may be attacked in the remaining cities of the voyage,” Albiers said grimly. “While there isn't much we can really do to be more prepared than we are, we do need to be aware of the possibility. I will emphasize this again:
no one
goes off the ship unarmed. Yun and North Hold are friendly territory, but nonetheless. Consider nowhere safe until we're back at dock in Newport, clear?”

The sergeants, including Erik, all nodded their acquiescence. Albiers eyed them grimly and returned the nod. “Hopefully, I'm being unnecessarily paranoid, but I'd rather be paranoid and wrong than optimistic and dead.”

“It's confirmed, sir,” Dairn admitted unwillingly. “The
Cloudrunner
sailed this morning.”

“Salshar curse him,” Brane swore. “What is the man, a Fires-burnt turtle? He pulled his head in and we never even burning
saw
him.”

The junior agent, wisely, said nothing, and Brane's tirade faded to silence as he regarded the view out of his window. Finally, the Red Dragon reached down onto his desk and picked up a single piece of paper.

He glanced down the simple list of numbers and names – dates and cities. “They're headed to Yun next,” Brane said flatly.

“Yes sir,” Dairn said solidly.

“Send a message…” Brane began to say, and then trailed off. “Burn that,” he suddenly snarled. “Talk to the Skyborne detachment that's in town. I need a dragon and a rider.”

“You're pursuing him, sir?” Dairn asked.

“The only way to be certain it’s done right is to do it myself,” the Red Dragon captain replied. “You're in command until I get back, understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Dairn replied, his face a mask.

The trip west along the Selt to Yun took five days. Five days in which Erik trained with his squad and worried about what awaited them in the city. Realizing that his archery wasn't up to the standard of the rest of the ship’s marines, he dragooned Enviers into providing him with extra training, outside the normal time frame of the squad's drill.

When they landed in the riverside reservoir at Yun, however, Albiers informed the men that the merchant they were dealing with was providing guards for the wagons carrying the goods into the city. The
Cloudrunner
would be providing a single squad to help supervise loading and unloading and maintaining its own security, but that left a full platoon free for shore leave.

First Platoon had the first day's duty, and there was some good-natured grumbling among Erik's squad, assigned to baby-sit the stevedores off-loading the cargo, as the men of Second Platoon scrambled past them into the city.

Erik and Ennie reminded the grumblers that they'd have their own chance tomorrow, and made sure the men were paying attention to their duties. Then Erik took the time to go meet his counterpart, the man commanding the platoon of men from Yun.

The men were well turned out, he noted. All forty of the men were apparently light infantry, skirmishers. While their main weapons appeared to be the Draconan-style short swords at their waists, each man had a small buckler – quite unlike the Draconan shield – and a bundle of javelins slung over their shoulder.

“You would be Sergeant Tarverro, I presume?” the commander of the platoon greeted him, offering a hand in the human greeting. “Lieutenant Hiakhan, Royal Skirmishers.”