The Assassins of Altis (19 page)

“We are still improvising?” Alain asked.

“That’s the plan, yes,” Mari assured him. “We’re going to improvise our way off of this ship.” She saw an open hatch with the darkness of night visible through it and dodged that way.

Out on deck there were Mechanics rushing around in singles and small groups. In their stolen jackets and the darkness, Mari and Alain blended in without notice. “Follow me.” There were life rafts fastened nearby, but they were small and lacked sails. Drifting helplessly on a small platform wouldn’t save them. With Alain still leaning on her, Mari ran toward the stern, where she could see lifeboat davits rising from the deck.

Skidding to a halt at the first boat, she bent to read the instructions, blessing the Mechanics Guild’s obsession with spelling out written procedures. “Just as I thought I remembered. It’s a gravity release system.”

“A what?”

“It doesn’t need any power,” Mari explained. Yanking off her pack, she tossed it in the boat. “Put your pack in there, too.” Then she hurled the weapons they had stolen into the boat as well.

As Alain threw his pack into the lifeboat, Mari pulled out heavy pins that had held the lowering mechanism locked, then threw herself against a big lever. Alain added his own strength and the lever swung over with a dull, metallic thunk.

The davits sagged outward, taking the boat out over the water, and the lines holding the lifeboat close to the davits began unreeling, the boat freefalling to land in the sea with a tremendous splash. Mari yanked off her stolen jacket and dropped it on the deck, gesturing to Alain to do the same.

“Hey, what’s going on?” A Senior Mechanic was staring at them, the same man who had led the group that had captured Mari. “Why are you lowering a lifeboat? I didn’t hear anything about abandoning ship.”

“We’re lightening the ship,” Mari yelled back. “Getting rid of excess weight. Captain’s orders.”

“That’s ridiculous! Who told you—? Hey! You’re—!”

Mari crouched slightly, spun, and kicked out, catching the Senior Mechanic in the gut and knocking him backwards. Straightening, Mari grabbed Alain’s hand. “Jump!” she whispered urgently.

Alain, bless the Mage, didn’t ask any questions, but went over the rail with her. The side of the ship rushed past as they hurtled downward, the drop briefly terrifying, then they hit the water and went at least a lance length underwater. Mari fought her way back to the surface, spluttering and trying to swim toward the lifeboat bobbing in the water nearby, the weight of her boots and her clothing trying to drag her back down.

For several heart-stopping moments Mari wondered if she would make it, then made a desperate lunge and closed one hand over the rail of the boat. Alain reached it at the same time she did and they helped each other in. Mari rolled onto the bottom of the boat, coming up against their packs and staring upward, where she could see the silhouette of the Mechanic who had been questioning them visible against the ship’s rail. The Senior Mechanic was pointing toward them and yelling. “Get the sail set, Alain. We’ve got to get out of here.”

The Mage stared helplessly at the mast mechanism.

“Sorry, I keep expecting you to do everything,” Mari gasped as she elbowed him aside, swinging up the small mast and locking it, then yanking at the lines holding the sail bound tightly to the mast. Her hands shivered with cold and water dripped off her clothing and hair in steady streams, but Mari tried to ignore those distractions. The sail came free, flapping for a moment before billowing out. “I’ll trim it. You get to the tiller and steer us out of here.”

“Tiller?”

“That stick thing at the back! Move it from side to side and the boat will turn. Hurry!”

As Alain threw himself to the back of the boat and awkwardly grabbed the tiller there came the unmistakable boom of a rifle shot, followed immediately by the flat, hard slap of a bullet hitting the water nearby. The lifeboat swung around, wallowing in a way that ironically made it harder for someone to aim at, then steadied, the sail now taut and the boat oh-so-slowly gaining speed away from the looming mass of the Mechanic Guild ship.

More shots rang out and tiny geysers erupted around the lifeboat. Mari grabbed one of the rifles she had thrown in the boat, then looked upward and back at the Mechanics shooting at her, knowing that she couldn’t fire back when some of her targets might be Mechanics like Kalif or Apprentice Madoka. Instead, she pointed her weapon nearly straight up and fired several shots, pumping the lever awkwardly with the rifle held that way, hoping the sound of the shots would frighten the Mechanics aiming at her and praying a lucky hit wouldn’t strike her or Alain. A
plonk
marked a hit on the boat, wood splintering under the impact. “What of the big Mechanic weapon?” Alain called. “The one on the front of the ship?”

“With power out on the ship they’ll have to train and load it manually. Hopefully they’ll be too busy with the fire to think of that until we’re too far away.” On the heels of her words, as if mocking them, a deep boom came from the direction of the ship, causing Mari’s heart to stutter with fear.

Mari waited for the roar of a heavy shell headed their way, frozen with dread of what even a near-miss would do to the frail wooden lifeboat. But then she realized that there hadn’t been any muzzle flash from the big gun and saw the dark shape of the Mechanic ship alter as it listed to one side. “Something blew up on that ship.” The ship listed more. “They’re flooding. Alain, they’re flooding the boiler room to put out the fire before it destroys the ship.”

“Will that sink them?”

“If I remember right, the idea is to take in enough water to put out the fire but not enough to sink yourself.” A few more shots rang out in a ragged volley and Mari heard bullets snapping by overhead. “We’re almost out of range.”

“They cannot pursue?” His voice had calmed, she realized, as her own tone had grown less worried, but Alain still sounded exhausted.

“No, they can’t follow us. That boiler room is out of order for a long time. I’d stake my Mechanics jacket on it.” She yanked open the lifeboat’s tiny emergency locker and checked the compass. “Which direction are we going, anyway? Let me see. East? Alain, you’re taking us back toward the Empire!”

“You told me to get away from the Mechanic ship as fast as possible,” he complained.

“Oh, yeah. All right, let’s go out a little farther until they’ve lost sight of us, then do a wide turn and head west. As long as we go west it should be impossible to miss the Sharr Isles since they’ve got some good mountainous heights.” She laughed, giddy with relief. “This’ll actually work out. We’ve escaped and the ship saw us heading back toward the Empire so maybe they’ll warn the Guild to look for us there. But we’ll still get to Caer Lyn and take a ship out of there to Altis.”

She could see Alain nod. “Our plan worked,” he said.

“Our plan?”

“The plan not to use a plan.”

“Oh, that plan. Are you being sarcastic, my Mage?”

“Perhaps,” Alain said.

“How long have you been planning to say that?”

“I just made it up.”

Mari couldn’t quite suppress another laugh. “All right, just for that, you can keep steering for a while, even though I’m happy to hear you making a joke.” Mari settled herself in the bow, trembling as reaction to recent events set in. She was torn between total tiredness and the residue of the fear which had been driving her. “It’s been another long day, hasn’t it? Once we’re on course we can tie that tiller to keep us going straight and maybe both get some sleep. It’s got to be several hours’ sailing time to the vicinity of the Sharr Isles.”

She saw Alain drooping over the tiller. “You went beyond your limit again to do what I asked, didn’t you?”

He raised his head and nodded. “It was necessary.”

“It’s still amazing what you can do, and that you keep finding the strength to do it.” Mari moved cautiously to sit next to Alain, uncertain of the stability of this boat, then held him tightly. “Have I told you today that I love you?”

“When you were being taken off the
Sun Runner
,” Alain said.

“I was afraid that would be the last time I could say it to you.” She took a deep breath. “Get a little sleep, Alain. You earned it. I’ll keep on eye on things for a while.”

He didn’t answer, and when she looked over at him Mari saw that his eyes were already shut.

She braced him against her, held the tiller, and looked up at the stars.

#

Mari blinked up at the darkness, wondering where she was. She looked to one side and Alain was there, lying right next to her, smiling at her. She smiled back, reaching for him. His hands were on her body, touching everywhere, and it was feeling very, very good and—

The door crashed open. Men and women came storming in, their faces shadowed but their Mechanics jackets a clear sign of their identities. The Mechanics were leveling weapons at her, demanding that she raise her arms high, and stars above she was naked in front of all of them and—

Mari jerked into wakefulness, staring at the bow of the boat , her breath coming rapidly, heart pounding in her chest. She must have fallen asleep next to Alain. The gentle rolling motion of the lifeboat hadn’t changed, providing a strange contrast to the violent action of her nightmare. Its sail was still drawing a good breeze,

Alain was stirring next to her, sitting up. Mari tried to pretend that she was still asleep, but it didn’t do any good. “You had another bad dream,” Alain said in a soft voice.

“After what we’ve been through, that shouldn’t be any surprise,” Mari mumbled.

“I believe these dreams have less to do with recent history than with things you will not speak of.”

There he went again. Bringing up her family. “Not a good time, Alain.”

“It is never a good time. Some nights you awaken in my arms, distressed, unhappy, and yet you will not ever speak of what haunts your dreams.”

Mari had been leaning against Alain. Now she sat up straighter, looking directly ahead. “You know why I have nightmares sometimes. It’s happened ever since I had to shoot those barbarians in Marandur.”

“Those nightmares are different,” Alain said. “You react differently in them. There is another reason you have nightmares.”

“Who made you such an expert on me?” Mari turned her most intimidating look on Alain. “This is my problem. I’ll figure it out. I’ll deal with it.”

“You are not alone.”

She almost snapped at him once more in response, then realized the statement had more than one meaning. By closing him out of her problems, she was closing him out of her life.

Mari took a few long, slow breaths. “It’s…guilt, I guess. And that’s probably because of my mother. It’s got to be her fault.”

“You blame your mother for your nightmares?”

“Why not? That’s what mothers are for. Daughters blame them for their problems.”

“Why does this stand between us?” Alain asked.

That took several more breaths, while Mari nerved herself enough to answer. “Because I want you so bad. Physically, I mean, as well as loving you. And I know I must feel guilty about that. Because having sex is how you have children, even if you’re taking measures not to have children, and if we have children…”

He waited, not saying anything.

“If we have children,” Mari said in a whisper, “I might do to them what my mother did to me.” She shuddered as the words finally left her, closing her eyes against the world around her.

Alain’s arm came around her, gently offering reassurance. “You do miss them.”

“No, I don’t! If I wasn’t good enough for them, then they’re not good enough for me!”

“Anger will only—”

“
I’m not getting angry!
”

There was a moment of silence before Alain spoke again with the tone of a man walking into a pit full of lions. “Since neither one of us is angry, may I mention something?”

This was going too far, too fast. Why couldn’t he just leave it alone? “As long as it has absolutely nothing to do with my parents, sure.”

“May I speak of mine?”

Mari glared down at the bottom of the boat. “All right,” she grumbled.

“The last words I heard my mother say were ‘remember us.’” Alain said. “I never could forget those words or my parents, and I feel certain that my parents never forgot me.”

Tears mingled with her rage this time. “That makes me feel so much better, hearing about how your parents never forgot you.” It came out sounding vicious, making Mari feel even worse.

“Mari, you gave me back the ability to feel, to stop denying my emotions. Why do you fight so hard to deny your own feelings?”

She just stared downward. “She abandoned me, Alain. Her own daughter, forgotten, tossed aside. My mother did that, and her blood flows in me.” Mari raised her gaze, meeting Alain’s eyes. “I can’t imagine ever doing that to a child of mine, but my mother did it, and her blood is in me, and so maybe someday I would. And I will not risk that, Alain. As long as there is any chance that I might cast a child of mine aside because I inherited such a dark legacy, then I will not have a child. Why is it so hard for you to understand how horrible that is for me to think about?”

“Because you have never told me of it,” he said.

Mari pretended to be concentrating on moving the tiller so that the boat was on just the right course. “All right, you have a point there,” she finally admitted. “But now you know, and I hope you will respect that this is not something to do with you. It’s me. I have to get through what happened.”

Alain nodded, his voice calm. “What do you believe happened, Mari?”

“With my parents? I don’t believe anything. I know.” Her voice was shaking with anger. “I went off to the Mechanics Guild and I never got a single letter from them. Not one, not ever. For a few years I kept hoping they would least send something on my birthday, but no, nothing, nothing at all, and I wrote so many letters to them, Alain, so many letters, and I was still a little girl and I poured my heart into those letters and I begged them to please write and they never did.” The tears were coming again, blast it. Mari watched them fall into the bottom of the boat and mingle with the small puddles of sea water there.

“You know that they never wrote?”

“I checked. For years I checked often with the retired Mechanic who served as the mail clerk for the Guild Hall, and he never had anything for me!” Mari had been only ten years old the last time she had asked about mail from her parents, but she could still see his face, the old man kindly and regretful.
Commons are like that. They get jealous. They cut you off. I’m really sorry, Mari. But you have the Guild now.

“Mari,” Alain said in a soft voice that barely carried, “did he tell you that no letters had been received, or that he had none for you?”

“What difference does it make how he said it?”

“Do you remember speaking with your friend Mechanic Calu about the letters he sent from the Guild Hall in Caer Lyn to you at the Mechanics Guild Academy, and the ones you sent to him and Mechanic Alli? At least some of those letters did not arrive, even though they were sent between Mechanics. Does this happen often?”

“No! I’ve never heard of any Mechanic complaining about it. I’m guessing now that I was being watched closer than I thought even then and that the Guild’s Senior Mechanics must have been intercepting some of my mail to see if I was being treasonous. But that’s not—” Something registered then, something too terrible to confront. “No. Oh, no, no, no.”

“My Guild never made any secret that we were to cut all ties to our parents,” Alain continued. “They taught us to believe our parents were nothing. The elders did this openly, because our training as Mages was believed to require it and because it ensured our loyalty to the Mage Guild. As I watched the Senior Mechanic on that ship taunt you, it came to me that your Guild took a different path, convincing you to deny your parents by making you believe that your parents had denied you. You know for a fact that some letters you sent were never delivered, and some sent to you were never received. This between Mechanics. What of letters to and from commons?” He paused, then spoke gently. “Your Guild elders lied to you about so much. I believe they lied about that as well.”

Mari was staring at him, feeling the tears streaming down her face again, but not in anger. No, what she was feeling now was a sense of dismay so deep it threatened to swallow her. “They lied to me and who knows how many others. We were just kids. We had no idea someone would do something like that. They cut us off from our families, and let us believe it was our families’ fault.”

“I think this may have happened, yes, Mari,” Alain said, his voice soft.

“No!” It was more a howl of despair than a word, and Mari hurled herself against Alain to clasp him and cry in great, trembling sobs. “Then my parents didn’t leave me. They never got my letters, did they? The Guild just burned their letters, probably, and told me, and told my friends, that our parents hated us now, and we believed them, and we believed that the Guild was the only family we had. Oh, no.” She couldn’t stop crying, wracked with more pain than she had ever let out, and Alain held her, saying nothing else for a long time.

Eventually Mari subsided to shivering, then finally was able to speak again, her voice sounding as lost as the place in her heart. “Gone. They’re gone. And it’s my fault for believing the lies of my Guild.”

“They are not gone,” Alain said.

“Yes, they are. How can I ever face them now? They never heard from me when I was an apprentice. I’ve been able to visit them for years and I never tried, never did anything. They must think I’m an awful Mechanic who looks down on them and wants to pretend they never existed. I can’t possibly ever face them.” Mari buried her face in Alain’s chest. “Why did you have to tell me this? It hurt less before, because at least I could blame them.”

“It is not too late.”

“Yes, it is!”

“It is too late for me to see my parents,” Alain continued, and Mari winced. “They are dead. You still have a chance to make it right.”

“Alain,” Mari whispered, “I can’t. I’m not strong enough, I’m not brave enough. I can’t go there.”

“You are not alone.”

This time it meant another thing, and she pulled back a little to stare up at him.

Alain nodded to her. “You do not need to be strong enough alone. You have a friend who will help you.”

“Would you really? But, Alain, even then—”

“I will be beside you.”

“What if they find out that you’re a Mage and they hate you?”

“If you are reassured that they love you, whatever they think of me would be a small thing.”

Mari’s despair was replaced by fear mingled with wonder. “Maybe I can, if you’re there with me. Maybe.” Mari looked out across the water, to the west where Caer Lyn lay, trying to grasp everything that had just happened. “My mother didn’t abandon me.”

“No.”

“I don’t have that in my blood.”

“No.”