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When everyone’s boarded, the steers guide the boats out into the centre of the river, one behind the other, a mixture of players and the backroom team on each. We glide out of the city, people cheering us on our way, the bands ramping up the volume, until the lead steer opens a borehole and we slip out of the zone.
Most steers are confined to a single realm – sometimes even to a specific stretch of river – but these six have the ability to travel between Sapphire and Topaz. Our schedule has been organised to give us three days in Sapphire before we cross, so that we can visit lots of different zones, affording as many Sapphirites as possible the chance to wave off their heroes.
It’s fun, drifting past towns and villages, waving to people lining the banks. They put on festivities in some places, similar to what we had in Cornan, only on a smaller scale. In others there’s no fanfare, just cheering and clapping.
We don’t disembark at any point. It’s an old Tourney tradition. The teams always spend a few days on the boats, to help them bond. Back in Cornan, I barely spoke with any of the players, since they were training the whole time, but now they can relax and mingle, so I get to meet lots of them, as well as people in the other backroom squads.
The boats often pull abreast between towns and villages, so we have a chance to cross and mix with those on the other craft. There’s a real party atmosphere. Even Baba Jen is a happy bunny, cracking (very rude) jokes and singing (very rude) songs.
I keep worrying that someone will fall overboard but the steers keep a close watch on their passengers, and one pops up whenever somebody teeters on the edge of a boat, to gently nudge them back to safety.
Each steer is dressed in faded robes of one colour, though the colour varies from steer to steer. All are barefoot, and all have silver eyes. They’re polite but don’t say much. I guess they don’t want to be distracted while on watch.
I’ve been keeping a watch too, on a specific passenger. During our first afternoon on the river, I heard a few people mention that items had gone missing. They weren’t bothered, just confused. They thought the objects had fallen out of their rucksacks and been knocked overboard.
I thought differently, and suspected Pol. The large backpack made sense now — he’d brought it because he was planning to pick up goodies along the way.
There was no point challenging Pol – rats steal, that’s their nature – so I settled for observing him, keeping a note of everything he was swiping. Then, a few times the next day, when he was on the prowl, I snuck over to his rucksack, removed the goods, and either returned them to their owners (slyly slipping them into pockets or bags) or placed them where they’d be found.
Pol has surely clocked what I’m up to, but he’s said nothing. I think he’s enjoying the game. The only trouble is, he’s more cunning than me, so there’s a good chance he’ll walk away with a lot of stuff no matter what I do.
I’m searching for Pol – he’s given me the slip, which isn’t easy on the boats – when someone puts their hands over my eyes and growls, “You have five questions to guess who I am.”
I already know who it is, despite her attempt to disguise her voice, but I’m happy to play along. “Are you a woman?” I ask.
“Yes,” she grunts.
“A gropster?”
“No.”
“A royal?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have a kind heart?”
She snickers. “Some might say so.”
“Are you pretty?”
She laughs out loud. “As pretty as a flower,” she coos.
“Then there’s only one person you could be,” I murmur. “Queen Pitina.”
In response, I earn a nasty dig in the ribs.
“Ow!” I gasp. “That hurt.”
“Good,” Ghita says, lowering her hands. The princess isn’t travelling to Topaz, but she’s come with us for the trip through Sapphire. We sit close to the edge of the boat and she asks who I was looking for.
“Just one of the other passengers,” I say evasively. I haven’t told anyone about Pol. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind his being here (apart from Pitina, who’d probably want to lock him up), but he’s proud that nobody has noticed him.
“Excited about the Tourney?” Ghita asks.
“Who isn’t?” I reply. “But I feel bad that I’ll be going to the matches, knowing almost nothing about grop, while thousands of real fans can’t get tickets.”
“But not so bad that you’ll give up your place?” Ghita smirks.
“No,” I laugh.
“I went to visit your friend with the statues before we left,” Ghita says. “He’s such a nice boy. A bit strange, but that’s to be expected, given his age and the fact that he’s lived alone for so long.”
“You’ll visit him again while we’re away?” I ask.
“Sure,” she says. “I’ll pop in to see him as often as I can.”
“Maybe the Departed will speak while you’re there,” I chuckle.
“They already did,” she says seriously, and my smile falters.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“What did they say?”
“They said...” She leans in close to whisper in my ear. “‘Tell Archie he stinks!’”
I punch her arm and she yelps.
“Very clever,” I scowl.
“I had you going, didn’t I?” she laughs.
“You should have been a thesp,” I pout.
“No, I wouldn’t have been any good at fooling strangers,” she says. “I can only fool people I like.” Her smile fades and she lays a hand on my knee. “I do like you, Archie. I think we could be good friends in the years going forward.”
“I hope so,” I say, my mouth drying up, wondering if I should put a hand on top of hers.
“But if you get yourself killed in Topaz...” she mutters.
“I don’t intend to,” I huff, then frown. “Do you think that’s likely?”
“This is a grim affair,” she says softly. “We made light of it in Moscow, but we’re really treading on thin ice here. Cindy doesn’t think it will work. She pretends she does, out of loyalty to Malina, but before she crossed, she confessed to me that she thinks it’s madness.”
Cindy returned to Topaz ahead of the rest of us.
“How about you?” I ask.
Ghita shrugs uneasily. “The stakes are so high. The futures of both realms are at stake — if it goes wrong and we lose Hugo, I’ll be the only Merged royal in Sapphire, and I won’t be able to prevent Pitina and Farkas from realigning the realm. I wish Hugo had sent someone else to do it.”
“Have you discussed this with Hugo?” I ask.
“Of course,” she says, “in Moscow and since we returned, but he’s determined to press ahead with the plan and be directly involved.”
“You could give him away,” I whisper. “Draw him near the edge of the boat and bump into him, so it looks like he’s going to be knocked over. The steer will grab him before that happens, but you can shriek his real name, as if you panicked. Then people would know it was him and he’d have to back out.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” Ghita says. “He’d have the perfect excuse for being here in disguise — he’d simply say he was desperate to take part in the Tourney.” She mulls it over, then sighs. “No, I can’t betray him. It wouldn’t be right.”
We’re passing through a zone where huge mushrooms grow along the banks, some as big as a house. She stares at the oversized mushrooms solemnly, as if they were omens of doom, then lies back and stretches out. I lie beside her and we look up at a yellow sky, speckled with fluffy blue clouds.
“I’m sure you’ll all come back safely,” Ghita says.
“Of course we will,” I say, trying to sound as if I mean it.
“And the gropsters will win the Tourney,” she says.
“And the royals will let us keep Hiroto as a prize,” I murmur.
We giggle, then Ghita sits up. “I’ve got to go,” she says. “I was looking for my bracelet when I spotted you.”
“What sort of a bracelet?” I ask, eyes narrowing.
“A copper one,” Ghita says. “Nothing special, but I’ve had it a long time. I must have misplaced it.”
I groan, then get to my feet. “Don’t worry,” I grunt. “I’ll find it.”
“Don’t make any promises you can’t keep,” she says. “It might have been knocked overboard.”
“I doubt it,” I sniff, then set off in search of an elusive, ratty thief.
And so the game continues.