Unfortunately, that meant Anton could no longer see him in the depths. He waited tensely to find out if the undead reaver would return to the fray. Time dragged until it seemed likely the answer was no. A breath later, a sailor let out a cheer, and his fellows joined in.
The moment after that, Stedd collapsed to his knees.
Anton crouched beside him. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” the boy whispered. “Just … that was harder than making all the food … it was the hardest thing yet …”
“I’m glad to hear it,” Kymas said. “You won’t feel tempted to make a fuss when we put your amulet back on and restore you to your friends in the lower tier. This time, I think we’ll tie you up as well.”
“Hold on,” Anton said.
The senior wizard turned to him. “I can see you and Umara have come to a genuine understanding, and I appreciate all you’ve done this morning. I look forward to welcoming you as you deserve. But it will have to wait until the prisoner’s secure. As he just demonstrated, he’s dangerous.”
“The pirates and sunlords both managed to hold him without torturing him.”
Kymas shrugged. “He’s growing more powerful, and in any case, what’s the difference?”
Anton didn’t know, and the prudent part of him urged him to let the matter go. Unfortunately, another part was set on having its way.
“Make me the boy’s warder,” he said. “I’ll manage him without breaking his mind or making him sick. That way, you can be sure he’ll reach Thay alive and fit for whatever you mean to do with him when you get there.”
“An interesting proposal,” Kymas said, “but I prefer the existing arrangements. Now, please, stand aside.” He gazed steadily into Anton’s eyes.
For a moment, Anton felt lightheaded, and then his sensible side finally came to the fore. He drew breath to tell the Red Wizard he could have it his way but then recalled the malaise that had afflicted him among the undead oarsmen. Kymas Nahpret had created that enchantment, and Anton’s sudden willingness to give way likely derived from a similar source.
The Turmishan clenched his fists. “Stay out of my head, you piece of dung.”
Kymas sighed. “This is so perverse of you. I truly did intend to honor whatever promise Umara made you, but by your pugnacity, you’ve forfeited any claim on my good will. Surrender your weapons.”
Anton whipped out his dagger, lunged, grabbed the wizard by the collar, and poised the blade at his throat. “No. You put the boy and me ashore. Or else you and I can die together.”
“You should have opted for your enchanted weapon,” Kymas replied. “Then murdering me would at least be possible, albeit unlikely. My dear, would you please put an end to this farce?”
Umara rattled off rhyming words and pointed at Anton. Pain ripped through his chest, and, gasping, he stiffened.
In that moment of incapacitation, Kymas wrenched himself free. Then he punched Anton in the head.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Anton fell to the deck unconscious, and Umara looked down at him with a knot of emotions pulling tight in her chest. She couldn’t untangle them all, but she did know she was angry.
Why did you make me do that? she silently asked. Why were you such an idiot?
Kymas gave her a sardonic look. “That was marginally helpful,” he said, “but if I’d been in the mood to brawl, I could have broken free at any time. Why didn’t you cast something a bit more lethal?”
Because she herself wasn’t sure, she made up a lie that ought to satisfy him: “I expended much of my power aboard the pirate ship and nearly all the rest when you and I were fighting the Chosen of Umberlee. I don’t have any lethal spells left.”
“Hm. Well, perhaps it worked out for the best.” The vampire turned to Ehmed Sepandem. “Now that the wizards have attended to all the difficult and dangerous tasks, maybe your men could at least muster the wherewithal to carry our two prisoners down to the lower oars.”
“Yes, lord,” the captain said.
When they all arrived there, Kymas had the mariners drag Stedd to the center of the rowing benches and bind him hand and foot. Then the vampire retrieved a skull-shaped medallion made of black metal from the bilge water and hung it around the boy’s neck. Umara could see Stedd straining to resist the talisman’s influence, but he quickly lapsed into a sort of twitching, shivering trance state nonetheless.
Kymas then glanced around at the zombies. The attack on the galley had so thoroughly battered a couple of the creatures as to rob them of animation. Others had suffered broken bones that would hinder them as they sought to row.
“Put our new guest behind an oar,” Kymas said. “He can take up some of the slack.”
“Yes, lord,” said a marine. “Uh, should I kill him? So you can make him like these other things?”
“No,” Kymas said, “just lock him down, and chain his hands to the oar while you’re at it. He can work himself to death here in the dark and the stink with the magic of the amulet gnawing away at him. It will give him the opportunity to reflect on his insolence.”
Umara watched the marines carry out their master’s instructions. Until, surprising herself, she blurted, “Is this truly necessary?”
Kymas regarded her quizzically. “The wretch didn’t just argue with me. He insulted and threatened me. I see no reason to grant him the mercy of a quick death.”
She took a breath. “I was thinking, must we kill him at all? I recognize his transgressions, but I also see that if not for him, we might neither of us be alive or have Lathander’s Chosen in our possession. Doesn’t it-”
“Balance the scales?” Kymas shook his head. “I’m disappointed in you, Red Wizard. What a very un-Thayan way to think.
“The lowly owe the high respect and obedience,” the vampire continued, “whereas the high don’t owe the lowly anything at all. Certainly not fairness, whatever that weakling’s notion actually means.”
Umara realized she’d pushed as hard as she dared. Bowing her head, she said, “Yes, Master. I understand.”
“I hope so. Let’s get out of here.”
Back on deck, Kymas strode briskly toward the cabin under the quarterdeck, but not quite briskly enough. Suddenly, wisps of smoke puffed from his hands and face, and, sizzling, patches of alabaster skin charred black. His protective charm was failing, and despite the clouds and the rain, the light of the hidden sun was burning him.
He sprinted toward the stern, dodged through the wreckage of the fallen masts, threw open the hatch to his cabin, scrambled inside, and slammed it shut behind him. Umara scurried after him, hesitated, then rapped on a detail of the naval battle carved into the panel, a warship stuffed from prow to stern with spearmen.
“Come in,” he said, the hint of an edge in his cultured voice. “The screen is in position to block the light.”
It was, and by the time she stepped around it, his burns were already healing. “I’m glad you’re all right,” she said.
“You should be,” he replied, “considering that it was your foolishness that delayed me below deck.”
“I apologize.”
“The principle I just explained to you-that I shouldn’t have needed to explain-applies at every point up and down the great long ladder that is the world. It applies every bit as much between you and me as it does between your Turmishan friend and me.”
“I know that, lord.”
“Then come ‘apologize’ with your blood.”
As he bared her neck, he murmured, “I know you dislike this. I’ve always known. Do you know why I don’t change your loathing to pleasure?”
She hesitated. “Because a Red Wizard needs to learn to endure that which is difficult?”
“Well, yes, partly. But mostly because your aversion increases the pleasure for me.”
Anton gathered that he must, in his own bellicose and imbecilic fashion, have impressed the Thayans, for they hadn’t contented themselves with chaining down his feet. They’d also looped a set of manacles around his oar before locking them on his wrists, a hindrance that prevented him from reaching the narrow blade hidden in his boot.