Chapter 5
I arrive out of breath, Malkin hundreds of yards behind me. The Governor’s lapdog, a wiry man named Skeinn, emerges from the castle as I draw the makeshift rope harness back over my head. My chest aches from how hard the rope tugged every time the wood caught behind me.
“He’s been waiting on you,” Skeinn says, as if the Governor weren’t the one who sent me on a full lap of the Bluff in the first place. “Get upstairs.”
The Observatory, where the Governor spends most of his time, is the castle’s fifth floor.
I emerge from the dank stairwell to find the Governor pacing along the room’s seaward side.
The walls are made of wide windows, interrupted by stone pillars, providing him a way to monitor the entire isle and the sea.
His head snaps towards me. The Governor’s wet, weepy eyes are set in once-pale skin that has burned so often it’s turned to freckled beige leather. His hair has begun to thin but he continues to comb it over the middle of his scalp.
“Lady knight,” he says. It’s been nearly two years since he called me that with anything but mockery in his voice. And technically, he shouldn’t call me that at all. I’ve been stripped of rank, even if wrongly.
“Governor,” I say slowly.
Behind him, through the windows, is the warship.
The sight leaves me breathless. The Hellion is close enough now that I can make out the smudge of blood-red sails instead of just hazy gray.
The Governor has a spyglass in his hands, allowing him far more detail than my naked eye. I wish I could take a look.
I judge it will be another two hours before it arrives at the Bluff.
“How many ships have six masts?” he asks, as he fiddles with the device. My throat tightens.
It’s truly happening. Two years of waiting. I’d begun to wonder if the War-Father had forgotten me.
“Just one.” The words come out a whisper. The War-Father’s ship. Rancor. Three masts for sailing. And three spears, for three knights to key into the ship at once. She’s a true Hell-beast, the terror of our enemies.
If the Witch King had attacked Rancor instead of my Rampage, maybe we could have brought him down. As always the thought fills my mouth with the sour taste of failure. Harfor is dead because of me.
But with Rancor here to free me, the revenge I’ve been yearning for will finally be at hand. I can go after him at long last and make him pay for my slaughtered crew. I want the bastard to die in pain.
The Governor sets the spyglass upright on the windowsill and turns to face me.
“Do you still possess the Exalted’s letter? I should like to… refresh my memory.”
I reach up and work the cap off the leather necklace pendant. It’s hard not to smile as I draw out the thin scroll of algae-fiber paper. The Governor’s hand shakes as he reaches for the letter.
He and I both know everything is about to change. The Governor’s eyes stare down at the letter in his hands, stamped with the War-Father’s seal but written by a scribe. I’ve read it so many times I can recite it from memory.
You know my authority ends where civilization begins.
Should I usurp the council to free my prized knight and ward, they will accuse me of witch-blindness.
But I do not release you from your service.
Give me time to prove your innocence. I will restore you to War’s Glory when I may.
Remain obedient and follow the will of the council until that day.
The Governor keeps staring at the scrap of paper in his hands. At my trial, the council put me under his command. Soon, this dreary castle will be nothing but a memory.
He finishes reading the letter and rolls it slowly back up, before handing it to me as if it has the weight of a stone.
“Many congratulations, lady knight,” the Governor says. “It seems your time here is at its end.”
Hellions never sail out this way. I'm the only reason one would.
“Thank you.” I place the letter carefully back in its tube.
“You have proven obedient and loyal,” the Governor says, as if the taste of apple doesn’t still linger in my mouth.
“Here. Sit with me.” He gestures to the table where he spends most of his day, covered with a small feast of expensive foods that the Governor has hoarded for himself.
A bowl of dried, shriveled stone fruits.
Pickled vegetables. A plate of golden-brown biscuits.
Two small glass cups next to a jar of wine.
I’m not used to him treating me with any kindness. What if he was using the spyglass on Malkin and me, and this is a sick punishment for the apples?
But no, his change in personality makes sense. I was sent here as a witch, and now the Hellion's approach proves my innocence.
Pulling out a chair, I sit opposite the Governor. My mouth waters at the sight of the food.
“Eat,” the Governor says. When I hesitate, he nods and smiles. There’s a desperate glimmer in his eyes that I don’t like as he watches me.
“Thank you.” I reach for one of the biscuits with my left hand. I really don’t need the luxury, when I’ll be gone from here soon enough, but after two years of only food from the sea, scurvy grass for our health, and the occasional stolen treat, I can hardly say no.
“You are no doubt eager to restore your name,” he says as he pours wine into both cups.
“I’m eager to return to the war,” I agree. The Witch King has haunted my dreams, and I need him gone.
My lips close around the pastry. It’s so dry I can barely bite into it, and have to settle for gnawing off a flavorless corner. It must have been baked months ago. The Governor licks his lips.
“I… should wonder what you will say about the Bluff,” he continues, his voice pitching higher.
With a frown, I lean back in my chair and look at him. He pushes one of the cups across the table towards me, but I don’t reach for it.
“Why?”
“It’s a miserable little shithole, isn’t it?” the Governor says. His voice takes on a whining quality. I chew slowly, still grinding through the same tough bite, and stare at him. I feel like I’m trying to eat rocks.
Whatever misery I’ve lived through here has mostly been at his hands. The barren landscape is depressing, but no worse than the witch lands where I’ve spent my life fighting for our people’s safety.
And then something shifts in my head, and I remember what I’ve spent the last two years, insult by insult, slowly forgetting: that a knight commands respect.
That I am the adopted daughter of the Exalted War-Father.
By the tides, the man in front of me is worried what I’m going to say about him.
About how he’s treated me and everyone else here.
And the food he’s offering me—it isn’t because he’s realized I’m innocent of witchcraft.
It’s because he knows as soon as the Hellion arrives, I’ll have the power to crush him under my boot like a bug.
True, the rule of the isles isn’t under the War-Father’s command, but nobody cares about the Governor if they’ve stationed him all the way out here.
I place the biscuit back on the plate, only the corner missing.
“What do you want?” my voice comes out sharp. The Governor gulps visibly.
“Lady knight…?”
“From me. What do you want from me.”
“...To go home,” he whispers. I stare at him without expression until he bobs his head and continues.
“My bitch sister inherited everything. I petitioned to be given a position, anything, and what do I get? Governor of this.” He throws his hand out towards the windows.
“Murderers and whores and filth. I’m like you, lady knight. I don’t belong here. If I could just…”
“You’re nothing like me,” I interrupt.
The Governor wets his lips again.
“I mean no disrespect, lady knight. But surely, after ten years of loyal service, I deserve…”
For two years, this man has treated me like shit stuck to the bottom of his boot. And now that the War-Father’s ship is visible on the horizon, too far north to be on patrol, too far west to be headed anywhere but the Bluff, he suddenly thinks I’ll take his side?
“You don’t want an imperial knight for an enemy, so you think you can bribe me into forgetting the last two years,” I suggest calmly.
“Enemy?” His voice wavers. “I never meant to offend you. It is my task to punish those sent to the Bluff. I am a loyal servant of the Empire, just like you.”
I stare at him, jaw hard, waiting to see what he'll make of my silence. It stretches between us like a tugged rope, until suddenly it snaps.
“Do you think I took pleasure in it?” the Governor rants. He places a hand on his chest. “I have been your staunchest believer, hoping for the day you would be pardoned, but until that day came, I had to treat you as what the council named you: one exiled under suspicion of witchcraft.”
It's so easy to provoke a man into yelling.
“And Malkin?” I ask coldly. “She’s not a witch. What excuse do you have for her? For Angar? Trisven? The others? None accused of witchcraft.”
“I have not been half so cruel as the law allows me!”
“It’s insulting that you think I can be bribed. Especially by this.” I still feel like there’s sand in my teeth.
“It’s not a bribe,” he begs quickly. “It… it was only a token of my admiration, lady knight.”
I stand from the chair, and the Governor stands quickly too, wringing his hands.
“Please, I never meant… you have mistaken me terribly…”
“I’ve spent two years watching how you run the place. Save your breath.” I start back towards the stairs.
“Please, to be… abandoned, out here, in this horrible place, you must understand…”
“Understand this,” I growl over my shoulder. “If I do anything to get you off the Bluff, it won’t be for your benefit, but because the people stuck here deserve better than to be stuck here with you.”
“Is there nothing I can do?” he gasps.
I pause at the top of the stairs, grinding my teeth.
“You can give me back my uniform so I can greet our Exalted properly.”
“Done,” he squeaks.
“And you can drag out all the fucking wine and food you’ve hoarded for yourself, and throw a feast for the Hellion’s arrival.”
“I… I thought the Exalted did not eat anymore,” he says. Is the little shit actually trying to refuse me? He’s that determined to hold on to his little pleasures?
“Our War-Father does not,” I say. “But all the people you’re working to the bone deserve it more than you ever have.”
His shoulders tremble.
“Have I made myself clear?” I ask quietly, my voice cold. The Governor nods.
“Yes, lady knight,” he whispers. “It will be done. Just as you say.”