Black Sun (Between Earth and Sky, #1)(35)

She laughed at that, as if he had told a great joke, and perhaps he had. “Tomorrow you come out in the daylight. Wear a white skirt like the other men, not these black robes, let them see you. But…” She hesitated. “Keep your eyes covered, yeah? Sometimes it is best not to tell them everything at once.”

“I don’t have a workman’s skirt.”

“I’ll give you one. There’s clean ones in the storage under the awning.”

He thought about it. She was trying to show the men he was harmless, a man just like them. It was a lie, but he understood the necessity of it. “All right.”

“Good.” She stood up. “They’ll sleep on shore tonight and you in your room. I’ll be here on the ship, just outside your door, so if one of them gets the notion to come drown you in the middle of the night, I’ll be here to protect you.”

He thought of the crew—their songs, the camaraderie that he envied. He would not kill them if he didn’t have to, but if they impeded his mission, they would die. She would, too, although he did not enjoy that thought.

“Who protects you?” he asked, not doubting her abilities but curious to hear her answer.

It was brash, much like the captain herself.

“The sea herself,” she said. “I am her daughter, and when I’m with my mother”—she exhaled gustily—“nobody fucks with her children.”





CHAPTER 13




THE OBREGI MOUNTAINS

YEAR 319 OF THE SUN

(6 YEARS BEFORE CONVERGENCE)

Violence should only be used in defense, and even then, it corrupts. If you must kill your enemy, do it quickly and be done. To linger only invites humiliation of both the victim and the self, and there is no honor there.

— On the Philosophy of War, taught at the Hokaia War College



“These are very beautiful,” the stranger said as she entered the boy’s room. Her voice was low, rough, and had an accent Serapio had never heard before. Her footfalls were light and quick, and she carried something that she tapped against the stone floor in rhythm with her steps. “When Paadeh sent for me, he said you were talented, but I did not realize I was to train an artist.”

Serapio paused. Despite her flattery, something about the woman felt threatening, although he wasn’t sure what. He set his current carving down on his workbench. It was the same bench that Paadeh had first brought to his room two years ago. He slipped the chisel into his trouser pocket. It was not much of a weapon, but it was enough to dig into a throat or to sink into vulnerable flesh if he had to.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“You should be able to figure out the answer to that, crow son,” she said from across the room. He heard her pick up a carving from a shelf, presumably to admire it. Movement broke the line of light streaming in from the window as she tossed the piece up in the air and caught it again. He heard the wood slap dully against the flesh of her palm. “In fact, you should have expected me.”

“Please,” he said, voice strained. “Each of my carvings represents many hours of work. Does Marcal know you’re here?”

She snorted, but he heard the tap of wood being set back on the shelf.

“Your father thinks I’ve come to teach you how to use a staff to see.”

He cocked his head. “Have you?”

She exhaled, sounding annoyed. “After a fashion.”

She was being evasive on purpose, he could tell. The slight tic in her enunciation, the way her voice seemed to come from a distance, as if she wasn’t looking directly at him. He did not exactly fear the woman in his room, but something about her boldness, the way she spoke, kept him wary. He no longer had a guard or servants coming and going to care for him, and he was acutely aware that he was alone with a stranger whom he had not invited in. But she claimed that Paadeh had sent her. Did she know Paadeh was dead?

“Did you make all of these?”

He knew she must be talking about the small menagerie of wooden animal carvings he had meticulously arranged on the shelf along the far wall. “Yes.”

“And this trunk, too? The one on the table under the window?”

It was his triumph, an ornately carved trunk of rosewood, the lid a map of the Meridian continent hewn in meticulous detail. Paadeh had made him build it, insisting that Serapio learn geography and knowing the only way to do it right was to create the map on his own as only he could. His tutor had whipped his hands when he’d gotten something wrong and made him start again. Each city, road, sea, and mountain was to scale, his fingers committing to memory the lay of the continent better than any traditional map might have taught him, each mountain range and sea colored with his blood and sweat.

“Yes, I made the trunk.”

She was quiet, as if studying his art, studying him.

“You may call me Eedi,” she said, moving closer. Her footfalls ended abruptly. She fully blocked the little light that came into his room from the windows, increasing the shadows around him. He felt the weight of her gaze, heard the tap, tap of whatever she was holding against the floor. A staff, he realized.

“I am your second tutor,” she said, “and I am here to serve.”

He felt movement. Had she bowed to him?

“As Paadeh served?”

“Where is that old bastard?” she asked.