All things considered, his first surgery aboard the Pursuit—the flagship of the Fleet of the Tiger Eye—had gone better than Niclays had anticipated. He had been presented with a Lacustrine fellow who had been stung by a frilled and glowing quarl, rarely seen in these waters. The poor man had shrieked in agony while his leg took on the appearance of rawhide.
By a stroke of luck, Eizaru had once told Niclays exactly how to soothe a sting from this quarl. Niclays had cobbled together the ingredients and, lo and behold, the pirate was free of pain, if mutilated for life. He would be back to pillaging and killing again soon.
Having received word that the Seiikinese had sent the High Sea Guard to reclaim the dragon, the Golden Empress had ordered the fleet to scatter in all directions. The Pursuit would skirt the Abyss before sailing to the Sleepless Sea and unloading its forbidden cargo in the lawless city of Kawontay. The Eastern dragons were afraid of the Abyss, slow to enter it.
That night, Niclays found himself shivering in the rain on the three-foot stretch of the deck he had been allotted to sleep on. A few pirates had kicked him in the shins as they passed. He wondered dimly if anyone had ever felt worse than he did at this moment.
This was his life now. He should have been grateful for his little house in Orisima. Suddenly he missed the sunken hearth and the pothook, the bedding he left to air in the sun, the dark walls, and woven mats. It had not belonged to him, but it had kept a roof over his head.
A pair of booted feet appeared in front of him. He shrank away, expecting another kick.
“Gods lie weeping. Look at the state of you.”
The interpreter was standing over him, one hand on her hip. This time she wore a shawl and gloves that made him weak with envy. A cloud of dark hair, marbled with gray, sprang in tiny curls around her face. A band of silk kept it out of her eyes.
“No sea legs yet, I see, Old Red,” she said.
Niclays blinked. She spoke his language impeccably. Few but the Mentish spoke Mentish.
“I don’t suppose you feel well enough for supper, but I thought I’d bring it.” With a broad smile, she handed him a bowl. “The Golden Empress bids me tell you that you are now her master surgeon. You’re to be ready at all hours to tend her seafarers.”
“The quarl was a test, then,” he said gloomily.
“I’m afraid so.” She bent to kiss his cheek. “Laya Yidagé. Welcome aboard the Pursuit.”
“Niclays Roos. Would that I could greet you in a more dignified state, dear lady.” He squinted at the food. Rice and globs of pinkish meat. “Saint. Is that raw eel?”
“Be glad it’s not still wriggling. The last hostage had to bite its head off. That was before his head came off, of course.” Laya squeezed in beside him. “Cure a few more pirates and you might get it cooked. And somewhere a little more hospitable to sleep.”
“You realize I’m more likely to kill one of them. I have a degree in anatomy, but a master surgeon I am not.”
“I suggest you keep pretending otherwise.” She threw some of her cloak around him. “Here. It’s warm.”
“Thank you.” Niclays pulled it close and smiled wearily at her. “I beg you to distract me from this supposed meal. Tell me how you came to sail with the dreaded Golden Empress.”
While he winnowed the clean grains from the bloodstained rice, she did.
Laya had been born in the beautiful city of Kumenga, famous for its academies, sun wine, and limpid waters. As a child, she had thirsted for knowledge of the world, her interest fed by her father, an explorer, who had taught her several languages.
“One day, he set off for the East, determined to be the first Southerner to set foot in it in centuries,” she said. “He never came back, of course. No one does. Years later, I paid the pirates of the Sea of Carmentum to take me over the Abyss to find him.” Rain seeped down her cheek. “We came under fire by a ship in this fleet. Everyone was slain, but I pleaded for my life in Lacustrine, which surprised the captain. He took me to the Golden Empress, and I became her interpreter. It was that or the sword.”
“How long have you worked for her?”
She sighed. “Too long.”
“You must wish to go back to the South.”
“Of course,” she said, “but I would be a fool to try an escape. I am no navigator, Old Red, and the Abyss is wide.”
She had a point.
“Do you suppose, Mistress Yidagé—”
“Laya.”
“Laya. Do you suppose the Golden Empress would allow me to see the dragon below decks?”
Laya raised her eyebrows. “And why would you want to do that, pray tell?”
Niclays hesitated.
It would be safest to hold back. After all, many feared or mocked alchemy—but he imagined that Laya, having spent years on a pirate ship, would not be easily daunted.
“I am an alchemist,” he told her under his breath. “Not a great one—an amateur, really—but I have been trying, for the last decade, to create an elixir of immortality.” Her eyebrows crept higher. “I have so far failed in this endeavor, mostly thanks to a scarcity of decent ingredients. Given that the dragons can live for centuries, I was hoping to . . . study the one below. Before we reach Kawontay.”
“Before every part of its body is sold.” Laya nodded. “Usually I would advise you against mentioning this.”
“But?”
“The Golden Empress has a vested interest in immortality. Your alchemy may endear her to you.” She leaned closer, so their breath formed one plume. “There is a reason this ship is called the Pursuit, Niclays. Did you ever hear the story of the mulberry tree?”
Niclays knitted his eyebrows. “The mulberry tree?”
“It’s a little-known legend in the East. More myth than history.” Laya leaned against the gunwale. “Centuries ago, a sorceress was said to rule over an island called Komoridu. Black doves and white crows flocked to her, for she was mother to the outcasts.
“The story is told from the perspective of an unnamed woman, who is shunned by the people of Ginura. She hears whispers of Komoridu, where all are welcome, and decides she must get there by any means necessary. When she finally does, she goes to visit the fabled sorceress, whose power comes from a mulberry tree. A source of eternal life.”
Now his heart was pounding like a tabor.
“Although the legend has survived,” Laya said, “no one has ever been able to find Komoridu. For centuries, the scroll containing its story was kept on Feather Island. Someone stole it from the sacred archives and gave it to the Golden Empress . . . but it soon became apparent that part of it was missing. A part she believes is vital.”
Niclays was as raw as if he had been struck by lightning.
My aunt received it from a man who told her to carry it far from the East and never bring it back.
“Yes. You brought it to her.” Seeing his astonished expression, Laya smiled at him. “The final piece of the puzzle.”
The puzzle.
Jannart.
A sound grumbled through the belly of the ship. The Pursuit listed, shunting Niclays against Laya.
“Is it a storm?” he asked, his voice a notch higher than usual.
“Shh.”
The next sound was an echo of the first. Frowning, Laya got to her feet. Niclays rubbed some feeling back into his legs and followed. The Golden Empress was on the quarterdeck.
They were at the threshold of the Abyss, the place where even dragons feared to go, where the water deepened from green to black. And not a ripple marred the surface.
Within this impossible sea, every star, every constellation, every fold and spiral of the cosmos was reflected. As if there were two firmaments, and their ship was a ghost ship, adrift between worlds. The sea had turned itself to glass, so the heavens might finally look upon themselves.
“Did you ever see such a thing?” Niclays murmured.
Laya shook her head. “This is no natural thing.”
Not a single wave broke against the fleet. Each ship was as steady as if it were on land. The crew of the Pursuit stood in restless silence, but Niclays Roos was tranquil, entranced by the vision of the double universe. A balanced world, like the one described in the Tablet of Rumelabar.
What is below must be balanced by what is above, and in this is the precision of the universe.
Words that no one living understood. Words that had made Truyde send her lover across the sea with a plea for help that would go unheard. A lover who must now be dead.
Voices shouted in myriad languages. Niclays staggered back as spray exploded over the deck, drenching his hair in hot water. His moment of calm dissolved.
Bubbles swarmed around the hull. Laya clutched his arm. She ran with him to the nearest mast and seized the ropes.
“Laya,” he called to her, “what is happening?”
“I don’t know. Hold on!”
Niclays blinked away salt water, gasping. He shouted out as water roiled into the fleet, destroying a rowing boat and sweeping pirates off the decks. Their shrieks were lost to a sound he thought at first was thunder.
And then, as the sea crested the side of the Pursuit, it appeared. A mass of red-hot scale. Niclays stared in disbelief at the tail that ended in cruel spikes, at the wings that could have bridged the River Bugen. Amid the roar of the sea and the howl of the wind, a High Western swooped low over the fleet and screamed in triumph.
“MASTER,” it screamed. “SOON. SOON. SOON.”
