Harbinger: Fate's Forsaken: Book One (50 page)

The saltshaker
shot over their heads, faster than an arrow, and struck the wall behind them.
It ripped through a portrait of a mermaid — taking all of her teeth out
with it. The gaping hole in her mouth left her looking as shocked as Uncle
Martin.

“Gravy save us,
what was that?” he said as Jonathan helped him to his feet.

Jake rushed over
to the window “I don’t — oh, no.” His thin shoulders slumped and he
turned back to face them. “I accidentally linked the spell of indestructibility
to one for ballistics when I etched it on my staff.”

“What? I just
need to know if it’s safe to eat my breakfast in here.”

“It should be.
But just know that anything that hits the window is going to get catapulted
right back out.”

“Anything?”
Jonathan asked.

“Yes … wait
— don’t!”

But it was too
late. Jonathan sprinted for the window, left his feet with a
whoop
and collided with the glass. It
bent, screeching to hold his weight until it finally belched him back out. He
crashed into the table — taking napkins, plates and several large
candlesticks down with him — before he tumbled to the floor.

“What are you
doing to my dining room?” Mrs. Bimply shrilled. She stuck her head out from the
kitchen, and when she saw the carnage, the rose in her plump cheeks turned
scarlet. “Those were my good dishes, Mr. Martin!”

“They were the
Baron’s good dishes, actually. And I’ll make sure the boys steal you another
set. Now back to your lair, harpy!”

With a rather
indignant huff, Mrs. Bimply slammed the door on them.

Uncle Martin
twirled his mustache like a man up to no good. “Now that we’ve got all the
spoilsports taken care of, lets nick some mattresses and drag them down here
— then we’ll all have a go!”

Jonathan was
certainly up for that. They left in a rush — giving Kael a moment to talk
to Jake.

“Obviously, I
won’t ask you to risk your freedom — not when you’ve only just got it
back,” Kael said, when he’d finished explaining. “But I don’t see how we can do
this without your help.”

Jake hadn’t said
anything: he’d been staring out the window, and only moved every now and then
to push his spectacles back up the bridge of his nose. Kael had no idea what he
was thinking until he said: “You mean … you figured me into your plan?”

He thought that
was an odd thing to say. “Of course I did. Having a mage on your side is pretty
useful — especially if you think you can help us stay hidden.”

Jake nodded,
slowly. “I’m sure I can … it shouldn’t be too difficult.” Then his mouth bent
in the tiniest of smiles. “Of all the things a whisperer’s ever called me,
useful
certainly isn’t among them.”

Kael could
understand that. He liked Jake all right, but mercy — the man stank. He
had to turn his head every now and then just to get a breath of fresh air.

“Speaking of
mages,” he said, changing the subject. “Do you think there might be any more in
the castle worth saving? Any that might join our side?”

Jake’s smile
went hard. “The Duke is many things, but unfortunately
stupid
isn’t one of them. He only keeps his most loyal mages
inside his fortress. The rest — like me — are posted on cargo
ships. The one you’ve really got to worry about is Bartimus.”

“Who’s
Bartimus?”

“The court
mage,” Jake said, rather darkly. “He’s got a gold impetus: a ring he wears on
his middle finger. He’s the one who cast the spell that bound me to the Duke.”
He leaned back in his chair and propped his hands where an average man’s belly
might’ve been. “It’s smart of you to attack on a party night. The Duke doesn’t
like to have the mages around his guests, so he keeps them locked up in their
tower. Which should make things easier.”

True. Grisly as
it was, having the mages pinned in and defenseless made things
much
easier. Kael thought for a moment.
“In that case, if I were to mix a basic sleeping compound, do you think you
might be able to make it a little more … potent?”

“Certainly,”
Jake said, his smile hard. “Death is a battlemage’s trade, after all.”

*******

When all the
others were informed, there was only one person left that Kael needed to talk
to. Unfortunately, he couldn’t find her anywhere. After he’d scoured the
mansion twice over — a task that took him several days — he still
had no idea where Kyleigh was hiding. He didn’t even know where she slept. And
everyone else seemed to know about as much as he did.

“No, I haven’t
seen her since yesterday —”

“Yesterday?
Where was she?” Kael interrupted.

Aerilyn frowned.
“In the spell room with Jake. They were pouring over books and muttering about
all sorts of boring things.”

He’d already
looked in the spell room — twice. And he had no desire to go back in.
He’d hardly gotten the door open before the tang of magic washed over him and
made the bile rise in his throat. He fought his way through the teetering
shelves and piles of yellowed parchment for as long as he could hold his
breath, and then he’d slammed the door.

“You haven’t
seen her since?”

Aerilyn shook
her head. “No, but I wish I had. Everything’s so …” She twirled at her hair for
a moment. “Perhaps you can help me.”

Kael took a step
back. “I’m actually sort of —”

“It’s about
Lysander. I know he cares for me — after he went off the other day about
my part in the plan, I knew he cared. I can tell by the way he looks at me, how
he compliments my horrible artwork. And Papa obviously trusted Matteo … he must
have. Why else would he have given the pirates his ship?”” She smiled for a
moment, then slipped back into a frown. “But Lysander’s still a
pirate
! A horrible, grog-gulping pirate!
Oh, I don’t know what I should do. What
should
I do?”

She leaned
forward, as if he had all the answers and all she had to do was listen. He
realized there was only one path of escape. No promise to Lysander was worth
sitting through one of Aerilyn’s crying spells.

“I’m going to
tell you something, but you can’t tell a soul, all right?”

When she nodded,
he told her about Lysander’s secret. He told her what he did for the people of
the High Seas under the cover of darkness. He told her everything, and while he
spoke, her eyes grew wider.

“He’s a rogue
only in costume,” she said when he was finished. “He pretends to be a bad man
in order to hide the fact that he’s not.” She grabbed the front of Kael’s
shirt, so roughly that it put him on his toes. “He’s not really a pirate at all
— he’s a good man, isn’t he? I knew it! Oh!” She flung her arms around
his neck and very nearly choked him. “Thank you, Kael! Thank you for telling
me.”

“You’re
welcome,” he gasped.

As soon as he broke
free from Aerilyn, he headed straight for the library. If she’d been looking
over books with Jake, then she must have gone to the library to find them. All
he had to do was set up camp and wait for her to return.

But when he
opened the doors, it wasn’t Kyleigh he found: it was Lysander.

“Fancy meeting
you here,” he said with a grin. “What luck!”

Kael doubted
very seriously that luck had anything to do with it, especially since the book
Lysander was pretending to read was upside down. He’d been waiting.

“I think I
forgot my —”

“Actually, I was
hoping you’d be here. Do you have a moment?” He set the book on the table
behind him and began to pace, hands clasped smartly behind his back. “I confess
I have something to ask you. It’s about Aerilyn.”

“What about
her?” Kael said, discreetly positioning himself next to the door.

“I can’t stop
thinking about her,” Lysander replied after a moment. He quickened his pace and
his words came pouring out. “No, that isn’t entirely true — I
ache
for her. I can’t sleep, I can
hardly eat anything, and anything I do eat just tastes like sand. It’s
maddening!” He crossed his arms and glared stoically through the waves of his
hair. “I need to know, once and for all, if I have a chance. Do I have a
chance?”

“Uh —”

“And even if I do,
I
don’t
,” he exclaimed, thrusting his
hands in the air. “I can’t love her — she’s a
merchant
, by Gravy. We are the sea and the sky! The sea may love
the sky, but can he ever reach her? Can he ever hold her in his arms? Must they
be forever doomed to live apart?” Lysander slumped into one of the chairs and
buried his face in his hand.

Only when he
stopped talking did Kael realize how he truly felt. It was the fall of his
shoulders, the ragged defeat in his breath that finally convinced him: Captain
Lysander was heartbroken.

He told himself
he wouldn’t get distracted, but as much as he wanted to sprint from the room,
he couldn’t leave Lysander in torment. “What if the sky became the sea? If
Aerilyn became a pirate, could you love her?”

“Of course,” he
said, rather spitefully. “But however will I convince her? She’s so good and
I’m so … well, I try my hardest not to be good.”

“And yet you
are,” Kael said, playing on the words Aerilyn had spoken only moments before.
“Someone always has to be good. If the Duke is bad, and if merchants like
Chaucer serve the Duke …”

“They’re bad
too?” Lysander guessed. He thought intensely for a moment, the lights behind
his stormy eyes pulsed as they worked to generate a conclusion. “If those who
write the laws are bad, and
someone
has to be good, then it’s got to be us — it must be the outlaws, the
pirates! Ha!” He slapped his knee and sprang to his feet. “Aerilyn is so good
that’s it’s only a matter of time: she’ll come around to being a pirate, and
then we can be together!”

Kael was glad he
hadn’t been the one to say it. He didn’t want to get Lysander’s hopes up.

“Hold on a
moment,” Lysander called when he tried to make a hasty exit. “If you’re heading
out, would you be so kind as to take this down to the basement for me?” He
pulled a vial of dark liquid out of his breeches pocket. When he held it to the
light, it turned red.

“I didn’t know
there was a basement,” Kael said as he took the vial. It was strangely warm.

Lysander cleared
his throat. “Yes, well, it’s sort of out-of-the-way. There’s a trapdoor under
the main staircase that’ll lead you to it. I’d take it myself, but I’m already
running behind. I was supposed to meet Jake an hour ago — we’re
practicing the attack formation,” he added with a grin.

He strode from
the room before Kael could object, leaving him with yet another unwanted task.
At the rate things were going, he thought it might be a full year before they
were ready to face the Duke.

Beneath the spiral staircase was a
battered trapdoor — right where Lysander said it would be. At least the
basement didn’t look as dark and damp as Kael imagined it: a dim light glowed
out from the depths, illuminating the narrow ladder leading into the room
below.

He tucked the
vial of dark liquid into his pocket and tried not to step too heavily as he
made his way down. The ladder creaked under his feeble weight. He thought it
might collapse at any moment and fling him into the bowels of the mansion. But
miraculously enough, it held.

As his boots touched
the packed earth floor, he realized he was sweating. He thought it was his
nerves at first, but then he breathed in and his lungs nearly shriveled under
the heat. His collar began to cling to the back of his neck as he made his way
towards the light.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The noise
ricocheted off the walls, tore through the hot air and made his heart leap
directly into his throat. It was sharp, and stabbed mercilessly at the insides
of his ears. He had to clamp his hands over them just to keep moving.

He hurried
around the corner and nearly tripped when he saw what awaited him on the other
side: a trough of fire, filled to the brim with low-burning tongues of yellow
flame.

He thought he
couldn’t have found anything odder in a basement. The trough had been set into
the wall; it produced enough light to fill the whole wide-open room around it,
and enough heat to melt the snow from a dozen winters. To the right of the
trough were an anvil and a small shelf.

And leaning over
the anvil, thrashing at a red-hot piece of metal, was Kyleigh.

Her eyes glowed
in the fire of her work. Sparks flew up as her hammer came down. A wisp of
flame rose, hissed, and she beat it back into the iron. Then she turned and
thrust it into the trough, where the flames lapped hungrily at it. She dragged
an arm across her forehead and her eyes widened when she noticed Kael haunting
her doorway.

“Hold on a
moment,” she said. Then she reached up and with a sharp tug, pulled a metal lid
down on the flames, leaving only a thin sliver of light.

By the time his
eyes adjusted, she was standing next to him. She wore a loose-fitting tunic and
breeches with a thick leather apron tied over the top. Her gloves were cracked
and covered with singe marks. Her feet were bare — which Kael didn’t think
was a particularly good idea, considering the condition of the gloves.

“I was wondering
how long it would take you to find me,” she said, her lips bent in a smirk.
“I’ll admit I was expecting you much sooner.”

“You’re a
blacksmith?”

She shrugged.
“Not really. It’s a hobby more than anything. But I do find it intriguing.”

“Smithing?”

“Fire.” She
smiled, and light glanced her eyes. “Perhaps it’s the dragon in me, but I’ve
always enjoyed watching the flames do their work.” She held out her hand. “You
have something for me, don’t you? From Lysander? I thought so. I can smell it
on you.”