He tried to convey all this in the few steps it took him to reach the man, and it must have worked. Instead of drawing his sword or signaling an alarm, the guard had his chin raised and his hands planted on his hips. "Yes. Who are you, and what do you-"
Dariel swept his hand up, bringing with it the dagger. He slammed the blade in the soft center of the guard's neck. The man's face registered shock. His arms hung limp, and this may have fed his terror. His eyes cast about as if demanding that his body do things that it refused.
The prince said, "My name is Dariel Akaran, if you must know." He yanked the blade to the side, and pushed the guard's body over, so that the spray of crimson jetted away from him. Moving with the body's momentum, he kicked the guard from the pier. As the body splashed into the water, Dariel cast his eyes over the harbor, the deck of the nearest ship, portholes in its side, and the street leading away from the water. Nothing. No one seemed to have noticed. Not yet, at least.
He spun and said, "Last of the barrels in, lads, and then let's go!"
The others, Skylene included, stared at him. Birke's jaw dropped, exposing his canine teeth. Tam was so wide-eyed it looked like he feared for his own life. Even Tunnel looked uneasy.
"What?" Dariel asked, leaping back on the boat. "You think this could be bloodless? Gape at me later. Now let's keep moving or there'll be a lot more blood in the water. Quickly now, quickly."
The last barrels went on the deck. The ropes were untied. Dariel steered the boat away from the pier and turned it toward the open water. This was the part he had feared most. To be so close to success but needing moment after moment after moment in clear view of anyone watching. Work on the docks might not draw much attention, but a ship outbound in the middle of the night was a different matter. Dariel felt a hundred eyes drilling into the back of his head. He fought the urge to turn around as much as he held back from surging forward at full speed.
Steady, he told himself. Just steady forward. Off to make a delivery, that's all. Nothing suspicious here.
Right there before him, bobbing for anyone to see, floated the loose barrel. He wanted to ram the thing and fly, but if anybody saw him sail by it without retrieving it… He angled the boat toward it, pulled up until it bumped the side, and then instructed the crew to pull it aboard. Seconds passed as they grasped for it, but it slipped out of reach.
Skylene appeared beside him, looking back where he would not. "The body is in plain sight now," she whispered.
For the first time that night, sweat beaded on his forehead and ran down over his temples. He had to wipe it from the corners of his eyes. Still he did not turn around. He slid the boat toward the barrel, gently. Tam appeared with a boat hook. With it, they got the barrel secured against the side at the stern. Finally, they hauled it up.
Steady forward.
"They've seen it," Skylene said.
Dariel cursed. He tried to find something else to say, but nothing came.
"One guard is motioning to some others. He's pointing at the water."
"Giver!" Dariel ground through his teeth, watching as the headland crept closer. It might have been a plea, but it sounded more like a threat. Skylene glanced at him a moment, and then looked away.
"They converged on it," she reported. "It looks like they're preparing to launch a boat."
Steady forward.
As they neared the spit of land that would take them out of the harbor's sight line, he asked, "Well?"
Her elbow brushed his as the hull crossed into the deeper current coming around the headland, changing the boat's rocking. She did not answer until they fell into shadow. "I don't think they picked us out, but perhaps we should make haste."
And so they did. Dariel pushed the vessel even faster than before. They sped under the light of the stars, and then turned and ran around the bottom of the island as the eastern horizon warmed their faces with the coming sun. They were back at the soul catcher in no time.
If Tunnel had been impressive on the docks, he was a wonder now, stripped shirtless, muscles glistening with sweat as he heaved barrels onto his shoulders and ran up the steps. And though Tam had bumbled twice in as many days, he worked all the harder to make amends for it now. Dariel almost told him to slacken his pace, but the young one was working so hard he did not have the heart to dissuade him. Of course, they feared a league ship would arrive at any moment, but the hours passed without anyone showing. Before the noon hour they had the chamber stuffed with all but one of the pitch barrels, and soon after they had soaked a length of rope in pitch to create a wick.
All told, they had searched, debated, planned, sailed, loaded, run, and hauled throughout an entire day, a night, and into the next day. Still, when the work was complete and the others cleared the chamber to wait at the boat and Dariel stood alone with a torch burning in his hand, it seemed the moment had come too quickly. All he had to do was finish it.
Standing with the torch clouding the air of the chamber with black smoke, he pushed himself forward. One step and then another, and then he bent and brought the flame close to the pitch-soaked rope. Even then it was hard. He had to tell himself that this was not the same as on the platforms. He was not Val, going to his death. Nor was he Spratling, a child being orphaned for a second time. He would live through this act, and no souls would be lost by it. Just the opposite. This would save lives. Save souls. Perhaps even his own.
The wick took the flame and bloomed to life. Dariel watched it long enough to verify that it was good, and then he turned and dashed out and down the stone stairs, glad to feel the sea air on his face, unreasoningly gleeful that a vessel full of friends awaited him.
Years before, as he had raced away from the exploding platforms on the black-sailed Ballan, he had not looked back. He had feared whatever demon was rising there, all the rage roaring up into the heavens, the hands reaching out toward him. He could not have defined just what frightened him so, for it was many things overlapping, some submerged in memory but no less powerful. This time, he turned. He held the wheel as the prow cut the sea, but he twisted around and watched. The others around him clapped and cheered each explosion, for there were many. Hands grasped and patted joy to him, and he returned it.
What he saw was a plume of white smoke that rose slowly above the concussions of flaming rage. It tilted like a giant, like an enormous tree of ash unfurling into life. It looked wonderful. Peaceful. Thankful.
Three days later he beached the Lothan Aklun vessel on a sandspit in a shallow marsh area of Sumerled, just up the throat of a river that the People called Sheeven Lek. He watched as Tunnel directed the others to uncap the last barrel of pitch and let it pour out into the hull of the vessel. They lit it, and it went up fast, with a great whoosh that was a monster inhaling and then a burst of warmth that tilted Dariel back on his heels. He did not say a word of protest. No matter how beautiful the lines of the boat and how incredible the power within it, that was stolen power, trapped unwillingly. Enslaved. It could never be his and should be freed. So it was, and he almost felt he could hear the relief of the souls escaping.
And two days after that he met Mor and a small group of the People at the edge of the wilderness. Skylene presented him to her, all of them gathered on a stone slab elevated above the tamed woodlands to the east and the wilds stretching off to the west as far as the eye could see. The wilderness looked like it went on forever. Granite stones ran north to south in great undulating, weather-round ridges, like the crests of waves. At first, Dariel was not sure where to set his eyes: on the abundance of nature or on Mor, beautiful in the full light of the sun. He chose Mor.