“We can believe her.” Malachite stared into the distance and her tail moved a little. “The Fell have been stirred for turns by promises of weapons and magic in hidden forerunner cities.”
Jade grimaced in dismay. “Now they hear of Raksura helping groundlings to enter a sealed, ruined city.”
“They must think we have the weapon,” Chime finished her thought, the words out before he knew he was going to say them. Malachite turned the full intensity of her gaze on him and he forced himself not to twitch too violently. “The Fell went there hoping for a weapon. They must think we took it and that we’re going to use it on them.” Telling them that the Raksura didn’t have it, had no idea how to make it work, or even if it really was a weapon, wouldn’t help. Fell lied about everything and would hardly credit the idea that Raksura might be telling the truth.
Malachite’s attention returned to Jade. “As he says. I will take some of my warriors and go with the half-Fell to the Reaches, to warn Pearl and Celadon. You stay with the groundlings and find the Hians. I’ll leave you five warriors, and Shade and Lithe as well. Shade, in case there are forerunner doors that need to be opened, and Lithe, if you need a mentor to help find the Hians.”
And she doesn’t want the Fellborn queen to see them, Chime thought. He managed not to say it aloud.
Jade didn’t bare her teeth but from her tone Chime knew she wanted to. “What if it’s a trap?”
As if it was obvious, as if they were talking about whether the weather would be good for flying or not, Malachite said, “Then I’ll kill them all.”
Chime controlled a spine twitch and exchanged a glance with Balm. River seemed reluctantly impressed.
Malachite was already turning away to face the Fell queen.
“We’ve got to hurry, too,” Chime whispered, half to himself. Catch up with Moon and Stone, rescue Bramble, Merit, Delin and Callumkal. Or there might be nothing to come home to.
CHAPTER NINE
Bramble and Delin came up with a plan, sort of. She asked him, “Do you think we can get Vendoin to let us see Callumkal?”
“It would be a relief to know for certain that he lives.” Delin tapped a pen absently against the deck. “I have asked before, but have had no success.”
“You might have to trade her something.” Bramble was reluctant to suggest this. Mostly because she could think of too many ways it could go horribly wrong. The Fell poison’s scale pattern had finally faded from her skin and she had been able to shift for the first time in what felt like forever. The Hians had to realize this and she was terrified they would decide to give her more poison. But they couldn’t just sit here huddled in Delin’s cage hoping no one hurt them. “I think you need to maybe hint that you might help the Hians with whatever they’re doing, if they’ll let us all go.”
Delin’s golden brow furrowed as he considered it. “What if she agrees? Or pretends to agree, as is more likely?”
“Don’t help her. But if you could get her to tell you what she knows about the artifact . . .” Bramble flicked her fingers. “We’d have her talking, at least. Once she’s talking, she might say more than she means.”
The next time Aldoan came with their food, Delin dropped the hint that he might be more amenable if Vendoin asked. A few hours later, as the long day was stretching into afternoon, Aldoan reappeared and told Delin that Vendoin wanted to talk.
“Bramble will come with me.” Delin stood and tugged a tangle out of his long white hair.
Aldoan hesitated. “Vendoin did not say—”
“It will save you the trouble of guarding us separately.” Delin stepped to the doorway and waited expectantly.
After a moment of indecision, Aldoan gave in, and she led them away down the corridor.
They went forward along the curving corridor toward the steering cabin, trailed by Hians with fire weapons. But this time Aldoan turned into the wide passage that ran below the steering cabin, and led them to a room just off it. Delin stopped in the doorway and Bramble peeked over his shoulder.
It was a workroom, the stem-beams that supported the ceiling arching to give it more height. There were shelves and cabinets built against the moss walls, holding all sorts of ceramic jars, bound stacks of paper, rolls of paper protected by leather or wooden covers, and small devices made out of metal and glass that must be tools of some kind.
Vendoin stood beside a table in the center, where a scatter of papers lay next to a gray rock. The rock, the one Bramble had seen with Vendoin, Bemadin, and Lavinat up in the flying boat’s common room. Bramble tried not to react. Vendoin glanced up and didn’t seem surprised to see Bramble. Vendoin said, “Aldoan said you wished to speak to me. But perhaps you left it too late.”
“Perhaps I did,” Delin said, unperturbed. “It is a fine day; I appreciate the walk about the ship.”
Vendoin’s mouth shaped something that Bramble, back on the sunsailer, would have confidently interpreted as a smile. Now she wasn’t so sure. Vendoin said, “What do you make of this, then?”
Delin stepped into the room and moved to the table. Bramble followed, glancing back to note that Aldoan and the others stayed in the corridor. She stopped a few paces to one side of Delin, and got enough of a glance at the papers to see it was a translation into Kedaic. The other language looked like the glyphs of the foundation builder writing they had seen in the escarpment city. Delin frowned down at it. “Another translation of a builder work? From the city?”
He spoke Altanic, and Vendoin answered in the same language, “No. The inscriptions in the city were all fairly utilitarian, though interesting in their way. The foundation builders enjoining visitors to dock their craft correctly is still a work of poetry to modern Kish. They were useful to Callumkal only because he wished to reconstruct more of the language.”
Delin flicked a grim look at her. “Which you had already reconstructed in Hia Iserae, and simply withheld.”
She made a throwaway gesture, as if it was of no importance. “Have you ever encountered a reference to a forerunner place that indicated some sort of transportation, or transference, took place there? Something to do with the docking of ships, perhaps.”
Delin’s expression was thoughtful. Bramble’s armpit itched and she was sweating under her ragged shirt, but she was afraid to move, to distract Delin. He said, “This is something you need to know in order to use your new weapon?”
Bramble controlled a wince. She wasn’t sure that Delin should have revealed how much they knew, not yet.
Vendoin inclined her head, as if conceding a point, but Bramble thought she had just tensed with surprise. “You knew of it, then. You were after it too?”
On the other hand, it was nice to have confirmation that their suspicions were right.
Delin said, “I learned of it from your own writings, which I took from your bag before we left the sea-mount city. I suspected you of deception, but not that you would attack us with poisons.” He added, “If you let me speak to Callumkal, I will answer your questions about the forerunners.”
“Hmm.” Vendoin clearly wasn’t certain if she believed him. “But surely you wish to know how I learned about the weapon.” She put her hand on the rock. With a rasping sound it moved, expanding, pieces of it fanning out like folded paper. Bramble couldn’t help a twitch; though she knew better, a rock that moved was too much like a disguised predator, and part of her wanted to snatch up Delin and flee out of the room.
Delin eyed Vendoin. “You have arcane powers.”
“No. But there are Hian practioners who can move rock the way Jandera horticulturals can manipulate the sun moss. This fact is not commonly known, but is handy for examining buried foundation builder sites.”