Chapter Three

 

 

 

Comita was an active admiral.

Technically her office was below the upper helm, in a circular suite that commanded almost the same view as Navigation, but in practice she roamed the ship, acting as both captain and admiral as she kept tabs on her subordinates and made sure everything operated as it should. Tracking her down was easy enough. She left a trail of hyperefficient sailors in her wake, all of whom cast the occasional anxious glance over their shoulders.

I found her on the upper deck, examining the hydrofarms.

Most of our staple provisions were grown on Polaris, but the ship produced fresh greens, fish, and edible algae for its crew. Unlike the gardens on Polaris, this hydrofarm was built for function, not form, and the uniform lines of plants did little to soothe my anxiety. I passed through rows of green until I was within earshot of the admiral and the technician making his report.

“. . . trace elements of toxicity in the first purification cycle, but we get it all out by the third,” the tech said. Comita looked up as I rustled past an army of collards.

“Thank you, Jerome,” she said to the tech. “Compass Rose.”

“Admiral,” I said.

“Excuse me, Jerome. I look forward to reading your report.”

Jerome gave her a salute as Comita strode out of the garden. I nodded at the tech and followed, breathing in the humid air. Comita’s short stature was less evident here among the many rows of lettuce, spinach, and kale, and I followed her with my pulse pounding in my ears. She led me out of the greenhouse and through the ship’s less traveled passageways. These narrow hallways were usually reserved for the maintenance crews, and they were full of exposed pipes and the hiss of water and recycled air. I was out of breath by the time we returned to the lower helm.

“Let’s take a walk on deck,” Comita suggested. “We are far from any reported dead zones, and air toxicity levels are normal.”

We would be in full view of Navigation from the small deck at the base of the helm, which made me uneasy. I blinked into the harsh sunlight as she flung open the hatch. The deck was damp with spray, although the textured surface gripped the soles of my boots firmly, and the wind caught at my clothes and buffeted them around my legs and waist. Comita’s short cropped hair barely stirred as she beckoned me over to the starboard side.

The first traces of clouds floated on the horizon, gathering strength in thin wisps. Sunlight gleamed off the smooth surface of the water, refracting on the glass of the helm at our backs and the roofs of the hydrofarms ahead. Comita leaned against the starboard rail and looked out over the quiet sea.

“There is nothing unusual about a captain consulting a navigator on a clear day,” she said in a measured tone. “And no one will hear us here.”

The implication that someone might be listening made my skin itch.

“It won’t be clear for long,” I told her, pointing at the sky.

“It never is.” She smiled thinly. “So, Rose, do you have an answer for me?”

“I do,” I said. The next words caught in my throat and my hand clenched the rail. “I will do it. Anything for the fleet, and the Archipelago.”

“I am glad you feel that way. Not many would, in your position.” She met my eyes. “There is something else you should know. I will have no way of communicating with you directly while you are with Miranda. All communication will have to go through her, so watch what you say.”

“You don’t trust her, Captain?”

“She is a mercenary. I don’t trust anyone off of my ship, let alone a mercenary, and neither should you. Do your job, play it safe, and keep your eyes and ears open. Miranda has too much riding on this to renege, but there is always something beneath the surface. War is an iceberg. Remember that.”

“Yes, Admiral,” I said, not bothering to point out that neither she nor I had ever seen an iceberg.

“There is one more thing. You will no longer be under Polarian Fleet protection once you leave this ship. If word gets out that Polaris has undermined council authority, things will get complicated. For all intents and purposes, you must act as a member of her crew. If you are captured by another fleet, you will be on your own. Don’t let that happen. If it does, do whatever is necessary to escape, and we will deal with the consequences later. There is no need for you to lose your life at the hands of your own people. Don’t make me say this twice, Compass Rose. You are a rare sailor. I would not see you drowned.”

She turned away from me before I could see her face, leaving me speechless. “You leave within the hour. Pack your things.”

“Within the hour?” My voice squeaked. I had assumed that I would not leave until tomorrow at the earliest, if not a week from now.

“This storm and Walker’s intel changes things. I want you safely to the parley point and my vessel back to the North Star before this hits. You won’t have time to say goodbye to anyone, and the fewer people who know where you are, the better. Do you understand?”

“No,” I answered truthfully. I didn’t see how telling Harper my whereabouts would put Comita at risk. Harper was her own daughter, and was hardly likely to betray her mother to the council. A slight frown creased Comita’s forehead.

“What did I tell you about politics last night?”

“That they don’t make much sense to people like you and me,” I repeated.

“The same can be said of certain orders from your admiral.”

There was no mistaking her meaning. I clicked my teeth shut on my questions, stinging slightly from the reprimand.

“Report to the helm as soon as you are packed. Take clothes, and nothing more. I will have a scouting vessel ready for you, and all that you will need to serve under Miranda.”

 

•   •   •

 

My bunk had never looked so bleak. I stood in the doorway for a moment, then grabbed my fleet-issued hemp duffel and shoved my training clothes into it. There was plenty of space left over. I paused. The only other clothes I owned were fleet uniforms. Somehow, I didn’t think that would go over well on a Merc ship. I fingered the soft hemp trousers and the loose shirts in my drawer, then left them there. Instead, I picked up the small, crude carving Harper had given me one year for my birthday. It was supposed to be a jellyfish, but looked more like a drowned mushroom.

They called me “jelly” because my father was a drifter, and jellyfish ride the currents, unwanted wherever they go. Harper was the only one to soften the nickname.

“He calls you jelly because he’s jealous. Get it? Jelly?”

“Please, never abbreviate your words again. I get enough of that in the helm,” I’d said, but I’d been unable to hide the smile that followed me around the rest of that day.

I smiled again at the memory. Harper would be furious with me for leaving without saying goodbye. I could leave her a note, but that would be in direct defiance of Comita’s orders. I chewed my lip. Comita would tell Harper something, but would it be the truth?

There was nothing else to pack, except a few toiletries. I straightened the sheets on my bed and hoisted my bag. It was depressingly light.

My head felt tight as I ascended the stairs to the helm for what might be the last time. I clutched the duffel tightly in my fist and hoped nobody would ask me any questions. For once in my life, Maddox didn’t appear to torment me when I wanted it least, disproving my theory that he could smell my misery from across the ship. The only people I passed were sailors about their business. I avoided their eyes and walked more quickly.

I took the back passageways again. The bio-lights illuminated the tubes and pipes twining around each other like the eels in the salt pools on Cassiopeia. I didn’t see any more captive jellyfish, although the water in the light tubes was slightly clouded. The storm was going to be massive.

After the dimness of the hallways, the light in the helm was blinding. My eyes watered, and I blinked the false tears away. Comita was waiting with a handful of burly sailors I recognized by their uniforms if not by name.

“Fair seas, Compass Rose,” Comita said.

Her stern tone was at odds with a roughness that disarmed me. She cleared her throat, and for several moments I was afraid I might actually cry. Comita had shown more emotion toward me in the past twenty-four hours than in my entire time onboard the North Star.

“This way, navigator,” the largest of the sailors said. He had a flat face with a flatter nose, and his dark hair was slightly gray at the temple. The woman beside him was only slightly less intimidating, with biceps that were at least as thick as my thighs. The third sailor was another man, unremarkable except for a livid scar that ran the length of his face and neck.

These were no ordinary crew members. These were SHARKs, the Archipelago Fleet elite. I felt very small and fragile standing before them.

The woman held a thick binder, which I assumed enclosed copies of the charts I’d need to navigate for Miranda. It looked tiny next to her Amazonian figure. She tossed it to me, and I caught it awkwardly with one hand and packed it in with my clothes.

“All right, people, let’s move,” said the woman.

I was jostled between the two men as we exited the helm, and my stomach clenched as I realized where we were going.

The vessel bay was accessible by several routes. There were stairs and passages within the ship, and then there was the Ladder. I hated the Ladder. It was, more accurately, several ladders, but they all plunged down the side of the ship, pausing occasionally to allow room for a maintenance hatch. The fact that the ladder was fully encased in clear plastic several inches thick did not diminish the terror of descent. With a long drop below me and the pressure of the ocean all around, it was, in short, a thing of nightmare.

Rung after rung passed beneath my hands. One of the maintenance hatches had been used recently, and the maintenance tech had not bothered to take the time to wipe the water from her boots. My hands slipped on the wet rungs.

I lost my grip twice, catching myself both times just before one of the SHARKs could reach out and steady me. I was shaking by the time we reached the door that led to the vessel bay level. It opened into a tight tunnel, which did not ease my growing claustrophobia, and we had to pass through several more hatches as we navigated in between the bulkheads. The muscles on the female SHARK bulged as she turned the hatch wheels. I tried not to stare, but she caught my gaze and winked.

Despite everything, I blushed.

The last hatch led to the vessel bay. Here, the scouting subs bobbed in a pool of salt water, charging their batteries, along with some flotsam and the inevitable rogue jellyfish. Each vessel was sleek, designed for speed beneath the waves, and thick cables bobbed along the surface. I was reminded yet again of the sinuous eels of my childhood. Like some of the eels, these cables were also electric.

One of the subs was fully charged and disconnected, and a few techs were busy putting the finishing launch preparations together as we entered. The bio-lights were dimmer down here. I wondered how they were able to see what they were doing.

Maybe they would make a mistake, I hoped, and I would be forced to delay my departure.

My eyes found the doorway to the inner decks at the top of a long flight of stairs. I stared at it, willing Harper or Comita to step out and tell me that this was all a misunderstanding, or in Harper’s case a prank that had lost its humor. I was prepared to forgive her, as long as she emerged soon.

The seconds ticked by and the SHARKs joked with the techs, making their own operational sweep of the vessel.

“Come on, navigator,” the woman called out. “We’ve got coordinates to catch before this motherfucker blows.”

I tore my eyes away from the doorway and clambered awkwardly into the sub. Inside, the bio-light was even dimmer, if possible. I waited for my eyes to adjust before finding a low bench on the far wall alongside the instrument panels. There was a small window there, and I sought out the dwindling doorway again as the SHARKs piled in and the sub dropped through the first level. I heard the dock seal up, and then the gate below us opened into deep ocean. The sub whirred away and slipped easily into the nearest current.

“Make yourself useful, navigator,” the woman suggested.

I stumbled to my feet and approached the navigation panel. Coordinates mapped themselves onto the computer screen, glowing with the same blue green light as the bioluminescence in the bio-lights around us.

I hadn’t navigated for a sub before. It took me a few minutes to orient myself, which the tightness in my head impeded. It wasn’t the pressure change, although that took some time to adjust to as well. I missed the North Star already.

The blinking lights on the screen were no match for the sun or stars. I tried to block out the morbid jests of the SHARKs and concentrate on the currents, feeling the way they nudged at the sub. The female SHARK even let me take the wheel, which momentarily dispelled all of my fears and misgivings. The sub handled more lightly than a fleet vessel, and the power mechanisms were slightly different. I glanced around at the various instruments, trying to make sense of things.

“How does it work?” I asked.

“Are you a navigator or an engineer?” Flat Nose said with a sneer. “There’s a manual in here somewhere. A little light reading for you.”

I shut up after that.

The parley point was two hours away, past the range of Fleet sonar, which would give the vessel just enough time to return to the North Star before things hit the soup topside and docking grew difficult even beneath the waves. The SHARKs gradually fell silent, hulking in the small space like their namesake. My thoughts turned toward Miranda.

Miranda the mercenary. Mercenary Miranda. It had a nice ring to it, if a slightly ominous one. How had Comita made contact with her? What exactly was I supposed to be doing onboard her illegitimate vessel?

Miranda was the mercenary spy, I tried to reassure myself. I was just the navigator. My lip twitched in bleak amusement. I had been on a ship long enough to know a shifting current when I felt one. Things were never quite that simple. Few roles were as important as a navigator’s. The captain called the shots, but the navigators told the captain where to sail.

If Miranda sank, I sank with her.

“We’re almost there,” I said, keeping my voice flat.

“Alright, kiddo,” the SHARK woman said. “Here’s how this is gonna go down. We’ll breach and dock against their vessel. It should be a small one, an intermediary, if they follow the rules of parley.”

“Which they never do,” the scarred SHARK added.

“We hand you over,” the woman continued, “unless things look soupy, and then we’ll try to bail.”

“With or without you,” the scarred SHARK promised.

“We bail with you. You are the mission priority as long as you’re on this sub.” The woman ignored the other man’s comment. “All you have to do is sit tight, look pretty, and try not to piss off the Mercs.”

She winked at me again, bringing on another blush. I hoped it didn’t show in the half dark.

“All right then.” Flat Nose stood and cracked his knuckles, stretching out his trunkish forearms. “Let’s get wet.”

My stomach plummeted as the vessel rose. The water was definitely getting murkier outside the window, and I resumed my seat while the pros took over. I felt the vibration of a water horn through the sub’s wall, and knew that we’d been hailed by the other vessel.

Panic tightened my throat. This was not how things were supposed to be. I was going to be second mate one day, and Harper was destined to be chief of engineering of the North Star. This was wrong. It was all wrong. I didn’t care about supply lines or politics. Comita could find someone else to wage her war on the sea and on the pirates. Politics were above my pay grade, and espionage was nowhere in my job description.

That wasn’t true, I thought with another wave of dread. It was in there, with firm warnings about how dabbling in intrigue would end up with me taking a long walk off a short pier.

I whimpered deep in my throat as the surf frothed against the window.

“Looks like your ride is here, kid.” There was a thump as a line hit the roof of the sub, and the SHARKs piled cautiously out of the hatch. It was only after the last one vanished that I noticed how heavily armed they were. My teeth began to chatter.

“Hey-oh,” a strange woman’s voice called.

“Parley,” said the female SHARK.

“You got the navigator?” The stranger asked.

“You got any manners?” The SHARK shot back. “We’ll need some proof before we hand her over to you.”

“Here— signed and sealed by Miranda herself.” There was the sound of someone spitting, and the bump of two vessels docking.

“No need to tie us on. We won’t be staying for a drink,” said the female SHARK.

“Too bad. There’s a big old cocktail all around you, and you look a little thirsty,” said the mercenary. I didn’t like her tone at all.

“I’ve got orders not to kill you, scum, so shut your mouth before I make my admiral wish she’d drowned my mother before I was born,” said the SHARK woman.

The mercenary laughed before replying.

“Your mother was too ugly to drown. Ocean spat her right back out.”

“Ain’t that the truth. Sounds like you’ve met her, seas save you.” The SHARK woman laughed along with the mercenary. “Anyway, looks like this checks out. Hey kid!” She leaned down the hatch. “You’ve got some new friends out here anxious to meet you.”

I didn’t piss myself, which is all I could say about my courage as I climbed the ladder. The clouds were mounting heavily now, and the waves had turned into swells. A small vessel bobbed alongside our sub, its battered hull more rust than steel.

On it stood a group of people I could happily have gone a lifetime without meeting up close. Tattoos covered most of their available skin, and there was a leanness to their bodies that suggested hunger more than discipline. None of them looked happy to see me in my clean fleet uniform. I counted six sets of scowls, each unique in its expression of distaste.

“Good luck, kiddo,” said the female SHARK. She squeezed my shoulder. “You’ll make Admiral Comita proud.”

Flat Nose thrust a rope ladder in my hands and tossed my duffel to the other deck. A huge, dark-skinned man caught it, with a smile that turned my blood to algae.

“Can you find your way, navigator?” Flat Nose asked.

I met his eyes. Beneath the cruel humor was a touch of pity. I nodded and swung out on the ladder. There was a dizzying feeling of weightlessness before the ladder caught, and then I had to focus all my energy on scaling the swinging thing and not slipping into the Atlantic. The water was darkening to match the clouds, and the spray wet the crude rungs as I dangled against the rusted hull. Large flakes of rust fell into the water as my boots scraped the side, revealing darker layers of corrosion beneath.

“I’ve had enough ladders for one day,” I whispered to myself as I climbed. Wind assaulted me in little gusts, and the spray from the surf drenched my trousers from the knee down within seconds. The rope ladder was made of tough hemp, and the fibers dug into my palms and slipped beneath my feet, making for a clumsy climb.

I was glad I couldn’t see the faces of the crew above me, or the derisive pity of the crew leaving me behind.

The top of the ladder came too soon. With an effortless motion, the dark-skinned man reached out and hauled me over the rail. I wasn’t ready for it. One of my boots tangled in the last rung and tugged free with a painful wrench. It wobbled unsteadily beneath me as he set me down, forcing me to grab onto his forearm for support. My pride wilted beneath the snort of laughter I heard from one of his crewmates.

In the unwanted proximity, I realized that his skin was actually brown, like mine. The black tone came from the grotesque kraken inked all across his chest and arms, resplendent in its glory only inches from my nose. Tattooed tentacles curled around his body with disturbingly lifelike suckers. The worst part was his face. Around his mouth, some twisted tattoo artist had detailed a kraken’s beak, and his real eyes were lost in the inky pupils of the massive squid-like orbs the artist had obviously seen in a nightmare before rendering onto flesh. I stifled a small scream.

“Welcome aboard, fleet scum,” he said cheerfully.

I stiffened my knees to prevent them from collapsing and tried not to wince at the pain in my ankle. Behind me, I heard the familiar gurgle of a fleet vessel subbing, lost to me now beneath the waves, just a dark shape beneath a darker sea.