L. Modesitt - Wellspring of Chaos

“Oooof…” The armsman dropped the useless sabre hilt, trying to dance back and draw a long knife, but his steps were wobbly.

Kharl’s were not, nor was his aim off. His second blow was to the man’s knife arm, and something cracked. His third shattered a kneecap, and the man toppled, slowly, sprawling onto the deck. The armsman did not make a sound, but lay on the deck, writhing.

Kharl stepped forward, his cudgel ready.

The attacker’s good hand went to his belt, and then to his mouth. He swallowed something.

Kharl grabbed for the man’s arm, but with a second swallow, the armsman convulsed. Kharl began to ring the bell that Hagen had attached to the bulkhead.

“What-” Lady Hyrietta’s head peered from the captain’s door.

“Lady! Stay there and bolt the door!”

Hyrietta did not argue, and Kharl heard the bolt slam home.

Within moments, Ghart and Hagen burst through the hatchway from the main deck.

In the dim light from the small lantern, Hagen looked down at the still-convulsing armsman.

“I tried to stop him without killing him, ser,” Kharl said. “But he took poison before I could get to him.”

“Poison?” Hagen looked to Ghart, then back at the fallen armsman, who gave a last shudder before slumping into silence.

“He put something in his mouth.”

“He did something to the outside guards,” Hagen said, his eyes darting from side to side, checking the passageway. “Could have offered them something to drink-water, wine. Both are dead. Poisoned, I’d say.”

“But…he’d been with Ghrant for years…that’s what they said.”

“Treachery…that has always been Ilteron’s way…” Hagen turned to Ghart. “Go find the undercaptain and tell him what happened. Then take care of this one. Don’t let anyone inside here. The undercaptain can look from the hatchway if he insists.”

“Yes, ser.”

Ghart made his way back onto the deck, closing the hatch behind him, leaving Hagen with Kharl in the passageway.

Hagen looked at Kharl. “He picked you.”

“I suppose he did.”

The captain laughed, mirthlessly. “Bad choice.”

“You knew they would,” Kharl said.

“I thought, if there were any treachery, that they would. I’d hoped that his personal guard would have been above subversion. I wasn’t about to wager the lady and the heirs on that hope, though.”

Ghart reappeared. “Undercaptain’s on his way.”

“I’ll talk to the lady.” Hagen turned and walked to the door to his cabin, where he knocked. “Lady Hyrietta? Hagen here.”

After a moment, the door opened a crack, then more.

“I need to come in for a moment.” The cabin door closed behind the captain, and Kharl could hear the sound of voices, but not the words.

Ghart looked at the body of the dead armsman, then at the deck near Kharl’s boots. He bent down and picked up the crossbow quarrel, its tip bent back.

“He must have hit something,” Kharl said. “He shot, then charged me.”

Ghart studied the deck again, this time picking up the shattered sections of the sabre. “I suppose he missed with this, too?”

Kharl shrugged. “He tried to get me. I used the cudgel. Maybe he wasn’t used to fighting in a narrow space.”

Ghart laughed, humorlessly. “We’ll leave it at that, but I think I’ll just make sure all this goes overboard. It’s probably better that way.”

“No one would believe I was that lucky,” Kharl said.

“You’re right about that,” Ghart replied as he turned with the bent quarrel and broken sabre fragments.

Before long, Kharl could hear voices outside the hatchway.

“Poisoned…bastard poisoned his own mates…You want me to believe that?”

“I daresay that Lord Hagen doesn’t much care what you believe, undercaptain. He knows what happened, and he knew it was likely…”

The undercaptain was furious. Kharl could feel the anger.

“You see why the captain wanted two sets of guards?” asked Ghart, his voice calm.

“…and your man killed him so we can’t find out…”

“No…Kharl disabled him, but he wasn’t quick enough to stop him from taking poison.”

“You want me to believe that…”

“One moment.”

Ghart reappeared in the passageway. He shook his head as he bent and grasped the dead armsman’s tunic and dragged the limp form out of the passageway, mostly closing the hatch behind him.

“…face is blue…”

“…poison does that…better believe it.”

Kharl waited, wondering if there would be another attempt to get to the lady and her sons. Yes, he decided. The question was merely whether the attempt would occur on the Seastag or elsewhere.

While he could hope that the attempts occurred where Hagen might prevent them, he had his doubts. Whenever there might be another attempt, it would be with greater stealth or greater force-or both. He didn’t doubt his own courage…but he did worry about knowing enough to deal with something that was less obvious.

Although Kharl and two others assigned to the passageway duty remained especially alert for the last two days of the voyage, there were no more attempts to attack either the armsmen or those standing duty in the passageway. Nor did the ship encounter any other vessels, not any that Kharl knew about, in any case. The seas had been calm, and there had not been much need for carpentry during the short voyage, for which Kharl had been grateful.

On a bright and much warmer eightday, one that was calm and windless, the Seastag steamed into the small harbor at Dykaru and tied up at the single narrow pier that served oceangoing vessels. At least a company of armsmen in yellow and black held the pier, as well as two squads of lancers in the same colors. Waiting opposite the spot where the Seastag tied up was a coach of golden oak, trimmed in black.

Wearing only a heavy gray shirt, Kharl looked beyond the pier, at Dykaru itself, not quite a city, rather a town composed of clusters of buildings, most of them with white plastered walls and orangish brown roof tiles. The trees were all broad-leafed, rather than the evergreens predominant in the north, and had remained green, rather than graying the way leafed trees did in the colder climes. On a low hillside to the west was a keep with light gray stone walls. The walls of the interior buildings were white and roofed in the same tile as the dwellings and structures in the town proper.

The harbor itself was empty of larger vessels, except for the Seastag , and a handful of fishing vessels at the smaller wharf to the west of deepwater pier.

From the foredeck, Kharl watched as the Lady Hyrietta and her sons crossed the main deck to the gangway and made their way down to the carriage. Hagen walked beside her the entire way to the coach, and the nurse followed. The armsmen in black and yellow surrounded them. After escorting the lady, her sons, and the nurse to the coach and closing the door, the captain bowed and stepped back. The lancers and the coach began to move, and then the armsmen on foot fell in behind.

Once the pier was clear, Hagen made his way back up the gangway.

Kharl watched as the captain stopped on the quarterdeck and surveyed the ship, then turned forward and made his way toward Kharl. The carpenter waited.

Hagen stopped several cubits away. “I wanted to thank you. I wasn’t totally fair, but I knew I could count on you, and there aren’t many in the world so trustworthy.”

“I don’t know that I am,” Kharl replied.

“In the things that matter you are. You’ve proved that time after time, but then, you probably did in Brysta as well.”

Kharl had his doubts about that. Instead, he asked, “What do you think will happen?”