Forty-Eight Preparations

FORTY-EIGHT

Preparations

SAMUEL

S pring rains began to fall on the Aeadine Anchorage. For ten days they continued unabated, dispelling the last vestiges of snow from the alleyways and raising a stifling fog. The temperature rose but remained rather cool, the kind of damp chill that made bones ache and the wood of the ship creak all the louder, even in the quiet waters of the harbor.

I met with my uncle twice during this time. They were largely impersonal affairs in which I strove to impress upon him my concerns about the Black Tide and reacquaint myself with the current state of the Navy and the government.

I found my questions rebutted at nearly every turn. Even though Hart would be sailing with the fleet, I was no longer one of Her Majesty's officers, and my uncle could not speak freely.

Being shut out by my own uncle and former admiral was not only painful, but endlessly frustrating. Even when I broached topics not directly related to the fleet and the coming conflict, such as restricting the arrival of Black Tide devotees, I was disregarded.

"I say this with full awareness of the past, but the Black Tide poses no real threat to Renown. Why ever would they? They are a nuisance, to be sure, and fools, but there is no law against idiocy," my uncle told me at our first meeting. "This port is not simply a naval base. It is a settlement, with citizenry who may do as they wish, within the law. I advise you to ignore them, Samuel."

"What of their ghisting?" I pressed. "The Ess Noti know of it, sir. What if there is a connection?"

"Then that is a matter for more appropriate parties to concern themselves with," was the admiral's reply. "Not an Usti privateer."

"Of greater concern is the mere twenty armed vessels in Renown," Alamay said that evening as I hosted a dinner in Hart 's great cabin, a company that included Maren, the Uknaras, Grant and Mary, and even Fisher, who had been brought fully into our confidences. She sat beside Maren, who nursed a cup of mildly alcoholic tea. "How many more ships can be brought in before the Mereish Fleet arrives?"

"Fifty," Ben replied. He had taken to smoking a pipe since our arrival, and a cloud of blue-tinted smoke clung to the ceiling above his head. The habit seemed to calm him, however, and no one complained.

"If we are fortunate," I hedged. Outside the open gallery windows to the rear of the room, rain pattered on the quiet harbor waters and fog obscured the town.

Fisher raised her own mug of rum-laced tea. "I shall be among them. I've accepted a temporary commission, and I was not alone. Three armed merchants have been pressed, captain through cabin boy."

"Still, I do not believe your people understand the threat to be as great as it is," Alamay said. "They do not believe the Tide will reach the heights the Ess Noti predict. They still believe their fortifications will mean something."

I watched the small woman, considering, not for the first time, what an asset she would be not only to the Aeadine but to my concerns about the Black Tide. She was already investigating. Perhaps I should encourage her efforts. Equip her, even. Perhaps she could not be wholly trusted, and I would need to be careful, but I was in want of allies.

And she had far more skills in espionage than I.

"How do you know what they believe?" Grant asked her from where he hunched over a spread of cards, playing a distracted game with himself. "Have you been spying on them?"

Alamay's level look was enough of an answer. She said, "Missives have been sent to Tithe to enlist the Usti's aid, but I doubt we have enough time."

"Tithe rarely has more than four Usti warships in the area," I said. "Even if they could render us aid, they must remain neutral."

"Outwardly, in any case," Olsa said.

"What will you do?" Benedict asked Alamay.

"I cannot say. It may be some time before I receive new orders."

"That is not what I asked," he pressed. "What will you do in the coming conflict? With your skills?"

The company was quiet, waiting for her response.

"I will remain aboard ship until after the Black Tide," the Usti spy said, though she did not add why—Ben remained in the dark about our plan to heal him. "But I will not fight, that is not my way. Then I will return to Hesten. Your brother has promised to deliver me there."

Ben did not look convinced. "You should tell us what you know of the Usti's meddling. Whatever documents Jessin Faucher gave Sam may be gone, but I cannot believe you are ignorant of what was in them."

Ben's words must have come with Otherworldly force, because Alamay's expression tightened in the barest, unwilling betrayal. She did know more than she chose to share. But that in itself was no great shock.

Ben caught my eye meaningfully.

"Why do you care?" Mary challenged Ben.

Ben only shrugged.

Alamay rallied, her expression growing opaque once more. "Even if Jessin's claims are true, and the powers of Mere and Aeadine could be convinced that my people are propagating their conflict, will they care? Do your divisions not already run too deep? Or will it cause a greater war—one where Usti is no longer neutral?"

"That would be catastrophic for everyone on the Winter Sea," Olsa pointed out.

Ben hid a smile in the corner of his lips. "What a shame that would be," he commented, placing his pipe back between his teeth and unleashing a fresh stream of smoke. "What chaos."

* * *

More ships began to arrive. Less than half of them had more than twenty guns, much to my uncle's displeasure, or were so new their paint glistened as they were drawn into Renown Harbor.

"Those ships are barely out of their cradles, and their crews might as well be," my uncle commented at our next meeting. We stood on the wall to the east of town, watching the newcomers drop anchor in organized formation. "Would that I could reinstate Benedict myself. His influence would go a very long way aboard one of those."

I slipped my hands into my pockets. "Can you not make an exception?"

My uncle's lips pressed into a thin line. At length he said, "No. However," his gaze swiveled to me, "if he were to prove himself during the battle, that would go a very long way. Unless, Samuel, you would advise me to abandon all hope for the boy and see him imprisoned for his own good. If you believe him too far gone—you must tell me."

I was grateful my hands were out of sight, concealing their sudden clench. "That did not end well for our mother."

Admiral Rosser's regret was clear but stiffened by practicality and years of acceptance. "No, it did not."

I gave myself a moment to breathe, pushing thoughts of my mother aside. "Ben is not lost yet, Uncle. He will prove himself."

Admiral Rosser nodded, and we returned to surveying the harbor.

I avoided the Black Tide Cult during this time, but Alamay, her efforts now quietly endorsed—in the privacy of my cabin by a pouch of gold and my own insight into the cult—brought me multiple reports of their movements.

"There are many more cultists than I saw in the forest, and I do not just mean that more have arrived—though some certainly have," Alamay told me one evening as we stood on deck, watching the new ships from Ismoathe run gun drills. Their crews scurried into the bellows, whistles and occasional lashes of their officers. "How prevalent is the cult, in general?"

I shook my head. "They've perhaps five thousand affiliates in all of Aeadine."

Alamay considered this, thoughts passing behind her blue eyes. "Perhaps a tenth of them are here now."

My skin crawled. "To worship the tides? Or have you uncovered any other purpose?"

The Usti woman shrugged. "I found nothing untoward in Mr. Pitten's personal correspondences, nor Lieutenant Adler's—he seems the most influential of the lot, thus far."

"Then we must bear with them and hope they do not shirk their duties in religious fervor," I said.

"Indeed."

On the thirteenth day, the rain broke and the sun washed Renown in a wave of unseasonable heat. The winds, too, shifted, coming up from the south in a steady stream. In the mornings the rock of the islands steamed in the sun, and the tides continued to rise. Two days on the waters also ceased any retreat, until the outer islands became perpetually submerged.

On the morning of our fifteenth day in Renown, as the rising sun cast Hart 's shadow across the waves and glinted in every east-facing window of the town, the warning bells began to ring.

I climbed to the maintop to find Mary already there, clustered with two crewfolk and a spyglass, conferring in low voices.

We could just see the western horizon around the shoulder of the fort and the stretch of the town. And there, where the line of the sea met the clear, brightening sky, I saw specks—towers of sails, white with a scattering of red and deep, lavish purple.

The Mereish Fleet had cleared the horizon. A mere thirty Aeadine vessels had arrived in Renown, and the outer islands were already submerged.

"A count, Ms. Echings?" I quietly asked one of the watch.

"Three dozen was my first count, sir," the wiry Ms. Echings, a dark-skinned northern Aeadine woman, replied. Her wide-set, round eyes were grim and humorless, well aware of all this meant. "But there are more."

"The proper tide is not until tomorrow morning," Mary whispered. Her hand slipped into mine, her other braced on the rail as Hart rocked in the gentle harbor waters. "Why are they here early? Shouldn't they wait for the water to be at its highest?"

"They know we have no hope of rallying aid in time," I replied, low enough for the wind to keep my words from Ms. Echings and her fellow watchman. "But we are not completely unprepared. Our orders will come soon."

"If they attack before the height of the tide…" Mary spoke equally quietly, her lips close enough to send gooseflesh prickling down my neck. "How long can the action last? If the highest tide comes and we're under attack… Your healing, Sam. How can we do that in the middle of battle?"

"We need to speak to Mr. Maren," I concluded.

We descended together. I dropped to the deck first and offered Mary a hand again, which she accepted. On our way across the deck I caught Olsa's eye, prying her from where she and a portion of the crew conferred over a spyglass and a narrow view of the Mereish lines, and nodded for her to follow.

"Ms. Poverly!" I called to the girl, who had been in Olsa's company. I nodded towards the fort. "Mind the signal flags and alert me as soon as there are any changes."

The girl bobbed her head. I brushed aside questioning glances from the rest of the crew, keeping my expression calm as we disappeared below.

Moments later, Mary, myself, and Olsa held council with Mr. Maren and Alamay in my cabin.

"The ritual must be done during the height of the Tide itself," Alamay said with a note of irritation. "Regardless of any ongoing battle."

"The Mereish may not wait until then to engage," I said, my mind a churning diagram of timings and tactics. "They likely intend to reduce Renown to rubble before then and head for the mainland before the waters retreat."

"Meaning we may all be dead or captured," Mary pointed out.

Alamay nodded stiffly. "Yes, but we cannot know that now unless a Sooth foresees it, and even then there may be leeway. Regardless. We have a day before the healing can be done, and, by my calculations, the best time will be soon after third morning bell. Too early, or too late, and the risk to all of us grows. If we are not finished by dawn, you will need to wait until next year, and our task will be much harder without the aid of the Other's moons."

"And if the time comes in the middle of battle?" Mary asked. She flicked her gaze to me. "Would you leave your post?"

"He must," Alamay returned flatly.

"The ritual will take no more than a few minutes," Mr. Maren added. "Though I cannot speak to your condition when we are through."

"Our plan remains unchanged, then," I summarized. "At third bell during the Second Turning of the Black Tides, we will convene here, perform the ritual with all haste, and return to duty. I will prepare my officers. And I will ensure Ben accompanies me below. Olsa, you and Illya should have your talismans ready—you must be prepared to subdue him."