The Edge of the World (28 page)

During the fifth day out of Windcatch, one of the women threw herself overboard, taking a young child with her, and both vanished
into the water. From that day forward Zarif Omra ordered all the women and children to be tied together and secured to iron
rings on the deck. Adrea hunkered down and returned to her defiant silence.

The war galleys finally docked in a coastal city south of Ishalem. Adrea heard the name Khenara spoken, a place out of exotic
stories. Now she was actually seeing it. She hated the sight.

The buildings were strange and foreign-looking. The people spoke a language she could not understand, though again she recognized
a few words. Shouting sailors ordered all of them to disembark from the war galleys. Standing with her fellow captives on
the sandy beach of Khenara, Adrea wondered if they would be sold here in a slave market, until she realized that this city
was not their final destination. The raiders hastily built an extensive camp and prepared for a much longer overland journey.

The air was warm and dusty, and the women and children slept out in the open on grassy slopes leading down to the beach. They
rested for a day while Omra and his men rounded up horses and pack animals for a caravan.

Looking at the sea, Adrea wanted to call out to Criston, who was out there, far beyond the horizon, but her voice would not
come. She simply sent her beseeching thoughts out to him.

The next day their captors led them away from the Oceansea, away from Tierra, and hopelessly far from anything Adrea had ever
known.

Since Asha was preoccupied with her latest project—not a bird with a broken wing or a stray cat this time, but an injured
man she’d recovered from Ishalem—Soldan-Shah Imir had his choice of returning to the quarters of his second wife, Villiki,
or spending the night alone.

While Villiki was pleased to have more of his time and attention, she often found excuses to avoid his physical advances,
suggesting a game of
xaries
or just conversations about court gossip (along with her advice on how he should handle certain political matters). Still,
it was better than spending the night alone in a cold bed.

Imir went to her quarters and lounged on the cushions while Villiki ordered her handmaidens to bring him tea, which she would
probably lace with soporific herbs so he would be too sleepy to attempt a drawn-out seduction. Villiki was still a fine-looking
woman, despite her age. (Imir knew he wasn’t being entirely fair, since he himself was seven years older than she.) She took
great care to maintain her beauty, preserve her skin, and wear perfectly fitting clothes.

Before he could relax in her presence, a servant came to the door, delivering a letter with due deference. The soldan-shah
frowned to see that it was the latest missive from Lithio, brought in by a horseman from Missinia.

Seeing the letter from his first wife, Villiki turned cold, and Imir felt his chances for sex vanish in an instant. With a
sigh, he read the letter, knowing what Lithio would say—how much she missed him, though she had never much cared for his company
when she had it. She asked again when he would come to visit her and bring their son, Omra. Imir knew she really didn’t
want
to see him, and she knew he wouldn’t make the journey; by making her request, she merely made him feel guilty. Her letter
went on for more than two pages with descriptions of her thorn hedges and flower gardens, a fountain that had broken, new
well-blooded yearlings that had just been brought to the Arikara stables. None of the news was the least bit interesting to
him.

When Villiki rubbed his shoulders invitingly, he knew that she wanted something. Maybe he could negotiate a better night after
all.… But before she could utter her request, a red-faced guard burst into the chamber. The last time Imir had seen one of
his soldiers so distraught, Ishalem had been on fire.

“It is Asha! Lady Asha! She’s been murdered!”

Imir lurched up from the cushions, not sure he’d heard properly. “Asha? But she’s.—”

“Strangled. Someone murdered her in her villa, then fled.”

Disbelief erupted in his heart and mind. He felt as though someone had struck him in the head with a heavy club. Who would
kill Asha? Why would anyone
want
to hurt Asha—sweet, beautiful Asha, who cared only about everyone and everything else, every lost cause? “Who? Who has done
this?”

“We think it was the man in her care, Soldan-Shah. The burned man who came from Ishalem.”

Imir moaned, knowing only too well how she took care of her pets. Asha would have wanted to tend the man herself, as though
he were the child she had never had.

“Oh, Asha!” He fell back on his automatic response, not daring to think further. He was the soldan-shah of all Uraba; he should
be able to solve any problem. “Call Kel Rovik—call all of my guards! I want horsemen in the streets, men to search every house,
door to door! Who was this man? What does he look like? What is his name?”

“We have no description, Soldan-Shah. He told no one his name. Even the doctors only saw him burned, covered with salves,
bandaged. Asha gave him the Sacraments herself, and fed him.”

No name, no appearance… the man had been a nameless victim from the city fire. A sudden chill went through his heart, freezing
even the horror and outrage. “What if he is a shadow-man, an evil spirit unleashed in the burning of Ishalem? What if he still
wanders Olabar, seeking other victims?”

Villiki strode over and yanked a cloak about herself. “I will go immediately to the church, have all the sikaras write and
burn prayer strips.”

A second thought fell into place for Imir—not supernatural, but just as frightening. “Or he could be an Aidenist assassin,
sent to infiltrate us so he could kill my wife—my
wives
. How many disguised murderers did King Korastine unleash among us after he killed Ambassador Giladen? We must find them!”

Kel Rovik burst into the room, accompanied by ten of his guards, all with scimitars drawn and ready.

“Hunt him down, Rovik!” Imir’s voice cracked. “Hunt down the murderer, bring him to justice! But don’t kill him—I must question
him.” After pacing around the room, Imir sank back to the cushions and placed his hands over his face as grief thundered through
him. “Oh, my Asha!”

Villiki was at his side with a whisper in his ear. “My love, my Imir. I am not afraid. You still have me. I will always.—”

It took every scrap of his control to keep from striking her. Imir pushed her roughly away, then staggered out of her quarters.
He needed to be with his guards, hunting through the streets for the murderer.

During a brief squall on their fifth day adrift, Criston feared that another horrific storm would whip up and smash the makeshift
raft to pieces, that the Leviathan itself would chase away the sea serpents and devour them in a single gulp. A drenching
rain fell.

Pockets in the bunched sailcloth captured water, with which they refilled the small keg. Criston and Prester Jerard scrambled
to fill an empty cask—and even the glass bottle that had held Criston’s letter to Adrea—with fresh water. They turned their
faces to the sky, mouths agape like hungry hatchlings, soothing their parched throats and drinking their fill. The rain passed
by midday.

The men ate the last of the food Criston had retrieved, then created makeshift nets from pockets of cloth to catch a few small
wriggling fish, which they ate raw and whole. Jerard even dangled his fishhook pendant over the side of the raft with a scrap
of bloodied bandage as bait. Though the symbolic hook was not sharp, they caught several fish that way, but when the thread
grew frayed, the prester feared he would lose his beloved pendant and placed it back around his neck.

The old man’s face was gaunt, his eyes shadowed with ever-worsening pain; Jerard shied away from changing the bandages, but
Criston finally removed the cloth and saw that the wound was swollen, bulging with pus and black strands of gangrene working
their way up Jerard’s arm. Criston said nothing, nor did the prester, but they both knew the old man would not survive long.

Keeping his face turned away from Jerard, Criston tightened the ropes because parts of the raft had begun to loosen, leaking
water. He still had the rope and the iron grappling hook, but nothing to fasten it to. To distract himself and the old prester,
he took out Captain Shay’s journal and studied the sketches and descriptions, but they offered no help, merely a reminder
of the captain’s thoughts and dreams.

Criston could see nothing in any direction as baking sun reflected off the waves, and the monotonous light began to make him
delirious. He tried to sleep, but the cool shelter of night seemed far away. He came back to his thoughts, confused and disoriented.

Fumbling with one hand, Prester Jerard slid the fishhook pendant over Criston’s head. The old man patted him, pressing the
symbol against his chest. “Take this. I don’t want the Leviathan to have it.”

“The Leviathan? What do you mean?” Criston blinked. “What are you doing?”

Jerard muttered a brief benediction. “You have a long journey ahead, but mine is at its end. I have longed to see Terravitae
all my life, and now I realize that I cannot get there by any earthly ship. I will find a different route to the land of Holy
Joron.”

He rolled himself off the side of the raft and into the water.

With a shout, Criston lurched after him and nearly fell off the creaking structure.

“May the Compass guide you,” the old man called as he stroked away. Reeling, Criston prepared to jump in and retrieve him.

As though Jerard had summoned it, a huge black sea serpent rose from the water, mottled with swirling patterns of golden scales.
It opened its mouth and made a sound that was partly a bark, partly a bellow. Steam whistled from its blowhole. Jerard raised
his hands from the water as if to fend it off—or to pray.

Criston yelled, trying to draw the serpent’s attention, but it had seen its prey. Like a striking viper, the sea serpent flashed
down to the water, mouth open wide. It grabbed the prester in its jaws and swallowed the old man in a single gulp.

Crying out in horror, Criston hurled the glass bottle, which shattered against the black scales, making the sea serpent flinch.
The monster twisted around, its gills flaring, its sharpened fins rising like bristling fur on the back of a cat.

Seeking something else to use as a weapon, Criston seized the grappling hook and twirled it over his head, letting the rope
play through his palms. He threw the sharp hook at the serpent, hating the creature for what it had done to his friend and
companion.

The serpent turned away, and the sharp iron hook caught and snagged in its blowhole. Startled, the serpent thrashed, which
only set the barbs deeper—then bolted, trying to flee. With the hooks in place, dug into the opening on the back of its head,
the creature could not submerge.

The rope paid out, burning Criston’s palms, but he could not hold the serpent back. Astonished, Criston recalled the story
of Sapier and his sea serpent…

Working urgently, he found the other end of the rope and secured it to the yardarm at the heart of the raft, gambling all
his hope on this one perilous possibility. If he were going to die, he might as well choose the time and place. The slack
in the rope suddenly ran out, slamming tight and making the whole raft shudder. Criston grabbed the edge to keep from being
thrown overboard.

The frantic sea monster reared up out of the water, keeping its blowhole above the surface, black and gold scales glittering
in the afternoon sun. With a great roar, the serpent plunged forward, churning up a furious wake and tugging the raft along
at breakneck speed.

Returning from the high mountains of Corag Reach, Aldo looked with a new eye upon the once-familiar buildings, waterways,
and bridges of Calay. He had not previously realized how seeing new landscapes could give him a different perspective on everyday
things.

When he arrived in the Saedran District with his crated navigational instruments, Aldo gave a young boy one of his few remaining
copper coins and told him to go find Biento and Yura na-Curic with the news that he had returned from Corag.

Knowing his main duty, he set off for the Saedran temple, eager to deliver the new instruments to Sen Leo. Inside, the scholar
came forward with a gleam in his eye. “So my young chartsman has passed the first test. You reached your destination, found
workers to do your bidding, managed the project to its culmination, and… paid a fair price, I presume?”

Sen Leo led them through the secret doorway, down the narrow steps, and into the vaulted underground chamber. Once they were
in the Mappa Mundi room, he helped Aldo to pry open the small crates, pulled aside the packing, and looked at the fine devices.
“I see the Corag craftsmen have outdone themselves. Again.”

“The fabricators wouldn’t allow me to look over their shoulders to monitor their work. They said I was disturbing them.”

“No doubt you were.” Sen Leo removed the first delicate instrument, adjusted the hemispherical gauges, and aligned the Saedran
markings. “Mmm, the armature moves smoothly. The calibration lines match perfectly.” He adjusted a lens, sighted along a graduated
line, and nodded. He set down the instrument and chose the sealed clock instead. “We will test this one against our own perfect
clock in Calay for months before we allow a chartsman to take it aboard a ship.”

Just then, his father bustled through the door of the upper temple. Glad to see his son, Biento threw his arms around Aldo,
patting him heavily on the back. “I missed you! Wen and Ilna have been constant pests since you’ve been gone. Your mother
could barely keep her sanity.”

“I missed all of you, too, but I saw many wonderful things, and now I can add my observations to the Saedran library.” He
looked up at the great map of the known world drawn on the temple walls and ceiling. Aldo saw the sparse details of Corag
Reach, where the sketched mountain peaks were symbolic rather than topographic.