The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire, #1)(45)

And my father, with all the vast power of an Empire waiting at his beck and call, turned his attention to me.





17





Jovis


An island in the Monkey’s Tail

He offered me five more coins to take the boy too. The boy was the son of a family friend, and his daughter hadn’t wanted to leave without him. It was a pittance in comparison to what the man had given for his daughter, but wasn’t I going that way already? And what was two stolen children if I was already going to be executed for one? The Empire couldn’t very well chop my head off twice. Not that they wouldn’t try, but I’d not heard of the Emperor bringing anyone back from the dead just yet.

These were the lies I told myself, because I didn’t want to admit that it seemed to make Mephi happy, and that mattered to me.

As soon as I’d agreed, the beast had climbed back down my shirt, curling his way around the children’s ankles and begging to be scratched about the ears – delighting and charming them both. I supposed it was just as well. If we all had to share my boat for a couple of days, at least one of us should be good with children.

I watched the man say goodbye to his daughter, both trying to hold back the tears. They’d not see one another again for a long time. He could report her as dead to the Empire. But Ilith’s spies were everywhere, and if he tried to follow they’d put the puzzle pieces together. I missed my own family more than I could say, so I let them have their moment. I hadn’t thought in a long time about how it must be for my mother and father – one son dead at eight years old, and the other gone for years, his face on reward posters from the Empire. I’d not written to them, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that I had a family at all. I didn’t think about it because it hurt to, like lifting the bandage on a wound that had never quite healed.

When they were done, I beckoned to the children. “Come on,” I said to them. “Keep close and don’t say anything.”

“What about the construct?” the girl asked.

I pivoted and lifted a finger. “That. That was saying something.”

“But—”

“If you say the wrong thing, we’ll all be caught, and the Empire will chop my head off.”

They both sucked their lips into their mouths, eyes wide. Mephi rose to his haunches and patted their arms with his paws. I let him comfort them, but there was no point in trying to shield them from this reality. Children understood life and death, though adults liked to think they didn’t. And I wanted to get out of this alive.

“Good? Good. Let’s go.”

I heard the tap of their footsteps as they followed me onto the docks. The construct saw me coming and hurried toward me. I ignored its approach, making a beeline for my boat. Mephi leapt aboard as soon as we were close enough, and I knelt to unwind the rope keeping us moored. Rain began to fall in large, splattering droplets, darkening the wood beneath me. I didn’t stop, even when the construct stopped in front of me.

“The Tithing is five days away,” the construct said. “You are not authorized to remove children from the island this close to the Festival.”

“That’s fine,” I said smoothly. “But I’m a soldier, and I have orders to take these children east.”

“You are not a soldier.” The construct spoke with a note of triumph, as though it had spent all day puzzling out my earlier words.

“I am,” I said. “I was shipwrecked, and I lost my uniform and my pin.”

“The Empire would have reissued them to you,” the construct said, still smug.

“They would have – if I’d the time to request them. But I’m on an urgent mission, and requesting a new uniform and pin would delay the purpose of that mission.”

The construct peered at me with narrowed eyes, the feathers on its head ruffling. “What urgent mission?”

I laughed, rose to my feet and tossed the end of the rope aboard. My boat drifted a little from the dock. The children behind me remained mercifully silent. “Are you trying to trick me? I’m not to speak of the mission objectives. The Emperor himself handed down the order.”

“The Emperor himself?”

“Yes.” I stared into the construct’s face, letting nothing crack. I was a soldier. I could tell this lie to myself and make it feel true. “Now stand aside and let me be on my way.”

“I cannot allow smugglers free passage in and out of the harbor.”

“I’m an Imperial soldier.”

“You have not shown me proof. You could be a smuggler.” The construct’s voice rose to a whine on the last words.

“You also don’t have proof that I’m a smuggler,” I said, reaching behind me to seize one of the children by the shirt. “I’ve got places to be.” I gave the girl a little heave to help her jump onto the boat, and took hold of the boy. The boy, having seen what I’d already done, jumped with my helping hands.

The construct muttered to itself on the dock, its voice like the whine of a boiling teapot.

I didn’t wait to see what conclusion it would reach. I leapt aboard my ship and set to work on the sails. Mephi followed me, chattering at my feet. If I still had bruises from the Ioph Carn’s beating, I couldn’t feel them. The sails hoisted easily, the rope pricking my palms. The rain began to fall in earnest, a gray gauzy curtain between us and the rest of the world. I lifted the cargo hatch as we began to move out of the harbor. “Go in here,” I told the children. “It’s dark and a little wet, and I’m sorry for that, but once we’re out on the ocean and away from other boats, I’ll let you up.”