5. The Emperor’s Captain
The Emperor’s Captain
Istudy Dezeeves, then Drake, then Dezeeves again.
“This is… strange,” I state.
“Do you think so?” Dezeeves asks, with surprise. “When a citizen exchange was discussed with The Assembly of State Craftsmen, your language skills were highly praised by the Queen, and her Ambassador to Hevalla, who was your mother, I believe?”
I’m still frozen. My head reels.
I rake through memories of my childhood. I suppose I did pick up Old Rhavnan from our tutor much faster than the other palace children, and I learned Hevallan easily from my mother in my very early childhood. I also enjoyed poring over books in foreign languages in the library and translating them.
But I had no memory of anyone recognising this as evidence of blood magic in me.
“I don’t know how that can be. I’ve never been aware of having—” Don’t say blood magic. “—a talent.”
Dezeeves pushes a strand of silver hair behind his ear. “Perhaps,” he says gently, “There was a time, once, when you were aware. Memory is a fleeting thing.”
I have so many questions.
“Why wouldn’t The Assembly have tried to use me, if they knew?”
“I’m afraid you would need to ask my brother that, who was the State Craftsman involved in those conversations. My guess would be that they would have used you, had other countries involved themselves in the war. As we all know – for better or for worse – as of yet, they have not.”
He claps his hands together.
“Excellent. Now that we are all acquainted, we can commence our boarding of The Emperor.”
I turn to Drake. Mutter to him, in Rhavnan, “Is he still speaking Hevallan? Or is this another language test I’m supposed to pass?”
“It is Hevallan,” Drake confirms. “He is taking us on his ship. As prisoners of war.”
Dezeeves waves his hand loosely. “Let’s just say I am something of a pioneer in the handling of prisoners.
You will be, well, more like crew.” He looks smug as the king he was named after, whose avarice brought about the downfall of what was the Hevallan kingdom.
“It’s so difficult to get any recruits these days – it does make my life harder.
But that’s the good thing about times of need. They do encourage one to be creative.”
His words finally, fully, reach me. My breath leaves me as I ask, “We’re going into the sky?”
Dezeeves chuckles.
“For a girl who can understand any language in the world, you do seem to have trouble understanding your own.”
He grins, flashing bucked teeth. They’re actually quite sharp. “Make sure you pack up all your belongings!” he calls, gesturing to the empty room and then erupting into more hacking laughter.
Can the happiest man in the world get happier? he’d asked.
I think he just did.
Reality hits me as I climb the ladder out of the cellar. Now I know my fate, I’m terrified.
A prisoner of war. It’s awful.
How long will I be away from Eric and Old Mother? What if the Sky Treaty is broken in that time?
Will they survive? Will I?
As I can do nothing else right now, I put all of my energy into keeping up with Dezeeves’ tight, quick steps through Temple’s corridors. We pass a couple of watchers, but they step aside to give us a wide berth the moment they see him. I would be doing exactly the same.
Outside, the setting sun is casting the world in bronze, and a ship has been landed. Against the harsh light, it looks like a perched dragonfly. It comes into focus as we near – a squat machine of brown metal with sharp wings on either side of its body and a long tail.
Even though I’ve seen ships up close before, from when crew rustlers have visited, the dizzying effect they have on me is the same as the first time I saw a ship.
They just seem so out of place. So unrelated to our world. Looking at them is like seeing into the future.
Dezeeves peers into the window and sighs. “Ah. I’m afraid we may have to wait just a little longer.” He eyes the two of us. “Oh, feel free to talk amongst yourselves. I’ll just be a moment.”
Dezeeves tugs at the door of the ship, which slides up with a clang, and he hoists himself inside. He grabs an item that looks like a headband, linked to the ship by a long tube.
Drake sidles up to me.
“You understand what is happening, don’t you?”
“Yes. How did you realise so quickly?”
“Dezeeves has something of a reputation among Rhavnan soldiers. He claims to have invented a way of converting soldiers to Hevalla’s side.” He visibly grimaces. “And his methods appear to work. Rhavnan soldiers have been seen in battle, fighting for Hevalla.”
My chest is sieged. “That sounds impossible.”
“And I agree. But I was taught never to go into something, expecting for only the possible.”
I blink. Those words sounded so wise, so strategic. Maybe he held a senior position on his ship.
“Although,” he adds, “Being taken up together would give us an advantage other prisoners may not have had.”
“So, that’s it, then,” I say, confidently. “We do everything in our power to stay together. Help each other.”
He nods. “An alliance.”
I scoff. “Not an alliance. A friendship.”
“A friendship,” he repeats, the sentence lilting, as if he’s never heard the word before.
“I saved your life,” I remind him. “We were locked in a cellar together, and now a madman is taking us as prisoners on his ship. Shared trauma tends to speed up friendship. Don’t you think?”
I almost add the part about how I feel strange shockwaves when we touch, but I think better of it. I’m not an expert, but I doubt that’s the sort of thing you tell a stranger. Especially one you want to befriend.
“All right, then,” he says, eventually. “A friendship.” He turns stern. Steadfast. “We trust each other. No one else.”
“Agreed.”
I stare at him a moment.
And then I have to look away, because I can feel the hot sting of tears in my eyes.
I’d thought I could hold them back.
I’ve failed.
“Ara.”
“I’m fine.”
But tears are falling freely now. I scrub at my eyes like I could scratch them right out for their betrayal.
“I just don’t know how my brother and my grandmother will cope with me being gone. Especially if it ends up being a long time. And if there are bombings.”
“We may be home in a matter of weeks. It could even be days.” His voice is so firm. Full of authority. I could listen to it all day. But…
“I don’t think so,” I say. “Everyone knows the people who go into the sky don’t come back. My friend—” I leave the sentence unfinished. I can’t seem to form Cosmer’s name right now.
“The weapon Rhavna has will change the war. Almost undoubtably end it. We will be home soon, Ara.”
Home.
Of course he means Rhavna.
But it’s my home here in Hevalla I’m thinking of.
“Do you really think that?”
“I do,” he says. He gives me a look that reminds me of the one he’d given me when he held the gun up to my head. The look that convinced me he was going to kill me. “Trust me.”
I decide he’s too close to me. I shuffle back a step.
And, from this angle, under the harsh light, I’m more certain than ever that I know him from somewhere. Even though I have no recollection of him. Old Mother might tell me I knew him in another life.
I don’t believe in souls or multiple lives.
Yet I do feel like I could close my eyes and draw him from memory.
“You are unsettled,” he states.
“You are…” Intense. “Unsettling.”
“Am I?” he asks – surprised, yet not.
“It’s odd. It’s like I want to run from you. Or hold your hand again. But I can’t choose which.” I blush. “Sorry. That sounds utterly ridiculous. Forget I said anything.”
His fingers twitch. He takes a step towards me, slipping his hand into mine.
We stand there like that, connected, like we’re one person, one entity. The shooting that begins within the skin of my palm and rises up my forearms is set off. But now that it no longer comes as a shock, I embrace it.
It feels pleasant. Like touching warm bathwater before you get into it.
“Do you still want to run?” he asks, steadily.
“No,” is my decision.
A loud voice startles me.
“Where are you?” Dezeeves is shouting from the ship. “I’ve known magicians who have disappeared less.”
Something about those words make me straighten, and my hand, still in Drake’s, clams up. I strain to hear the faint words coming through the headband Dezeeves is now wearing, but I can’t.
“And was she happy to see you? Ah. Never mind. It would probably have been quite a shock for her, after all this time.” A pause. More muffled words are spoken. “We’re all at the ship,” Dezeeves continues. “Yes. Ara, too.”
My pulse races. I cling to Drake tighter, like I’m a vine relying on him to grow.
With a sprightly jump, Dezeeves emerges from the ship.
“He’ll be here any second,” he chirps.
I speak through the lump in my throat.
“Who will be here?”
I sense him before I see him.
It’s a shift in energy. Like something wonderful is about to happen. But it will be short-lived. And painful. Leave you wishing it had never happened at all.
And then there he is, just cresting the mound of earth by the archway. He steps through it, face and skin shining in the sun.
I see him in pieces. His tall frame. Cheekbones.
His mop of copper-coloured hair.
The boy from the house next door is a man.
The boy from the house next door is alive.
He gives me a crooked smile, freckles popping in the light.
“Hello, neighbour,” my friend Cosmer says, flipping a small radio in his right hand and catching it. “It’s been forever.”
He looks down. Sees my hand in Drake’s.
As quickly as it came – and as quickly as he came, back into existence – his smile disappears.