Telemakos shook out the saddle’s familiar folds. The tanned hide was worn supple and smooth, nearly black in places. He buried his nose in it and caught, past the smell of leather, a trace of flour and spice, the faint baked scent of his sister’s skin. It made his throat ache with misery and longing. He took another deep breath, but the trace was gone; it was overwhelmed by leather and something like burnt poppy.
Poppy?
Telemakos glanced over his shoulder. Iskinder sat, as always, with his back turned. Telemakos hooked the shoulder strap over his head, so familiar a movement that again it made his throat suddenly close up with loneliness for Athena. He swallowed the loneliness and opened the saddle’s inner pocket. The dozen vials and packets of opium that he had disposed of during his stay in San’a were still there, untouched. So were the original portions his father had sent with him.
Have I got enough here to stupefy everyone on this ship? Telemakos wondered. He calculated roughly.
Maybe not enough to immobilize them, but enough to get their guard down. In the waterskins? Will they taste it? The waterskins and the wine jars; it’s more effective in wine. Then later, if enough of them are asleep, I can slip overboard and turn myself in to the Aksumite prison warden. Surely my own people will grant me sanctuary.
Telemakos shoved the vials and twists of paper into his own satchel and quietly folded his sister’s saddle in its place behind the chest. He went back to work, wild hope bubbling within him like a springing fountain. It would be easy to get to the supplies; Telemakos had been left by himself with them in the lower deck several times every day. No one paid any attention to him down there; Iskinder sat at the top of the stepladder, in the sun, and spoke to Telemakos only if Telemakos addressed him first. Telemakos had spent hours alone, the day before, watching one of Gebre Meskal’s ships pull close to the beach so that men could slosh through the water unloading supplies for the prison.
“I’ve finished here,” he said to Iskinder. “May I wait the rest of the afternoon below?”
“Keep your head down,” his guard said, and guided him to the ladder. Iskinder stayed at the top, waiting above with the rest of the crew as usual. Telemakos sat at the foot of the steps.
“Tell me when you see the najashi on his way back, will you, Iskinder? And if he is alone? He is setting free an enemy of mine.”
After some time Iskinder called down to him, “They’re on their way, just coming down to the hawris on the beach. Go take a look through the starboard oar holes at the back. Is that your man?”
Iskinder was above, watching the najashi and his attendants climb into the canoe, and Telemakos was alone for five minutes with the crew’s water supply and enough opium to stun several elephants.
He glanced through the oar hole. He could not see the hawri on its way.
His conscience hammered at him so mercilessly as he worked that all the sweet hope was suddenly made bitter with guilt. If Telemakos escaped, Iskinder would take the blame. He would be stripped of his advancement, maybe whipped, set to labor, imprisoned. It would be the same for any other guard who allowed my escape, Telemakos reasoned, and I would not suffer such pity for a stranger, would I? But I am sorry for Iskinder.
Maybe that’s why Abreha chose him for this job. He guessed how it would pain me to sabotage the one I had recommended, and then I might hesitate and fail to take my chance when it came.
But I’ll not hesitate.
He worked over the storage vessels in silent efficiency, with knees and nails and teeth.
“Morningstar?”
Telemakos stoppered the last waterskin shut, bracing the skin in place with one foot.
“Sorry. I was thirsty, and it takes me a long time to get one of these open.”
“I’d help you. Anyone would help you.”
“I’m all right.”
Telemakos had drunk as much as he could hold, before he had started. He did not know when he would next find uncontaminated water.
He folded himself into a corner of the hold with his knees against his chin to wait, but the najashi found him there. Abreha came down the narrow stepway past Iskinder and beckoned Telemakos to his feet.
“Come up. You must share this ship with your enemy for a brief time, and I do not like to see you skulking down here as though in cowardice.”
Abreha bent to one of the waterskins. He refilled his own leather bottle, drank from it, and offered it to Telemakos. Telemakos refused quietly.
“I’m all right.”
“Come up with me.” The najashi laid his hand across the back of Telemakos’s shoulders to propel him in the right direction.
Anako the Lazarus sat cross-legged and hunchbacked on the deck, a withered, sunken bundle of rags and bones. He had been heavy before his exile; the flesh hung off him loosely now, and his gray hair was so thin it looked as though his bare scalp was brushed with dirty cobwebs. He had been an evil man, and for all Telemakos knew, he was still evil; but he was also old, and ill, and frail, and without any power.
He had not forgotten Telemakos. When Anako raised his head, his look was filled with hatred.
“This is Lij Bitwoded Telemakos Eosphorus, the Morningstar, who has just completed an apprenticeship with my cartographer,” Abreha said. “I am aware you know each other of old, and have reason to consider yourself opponents. But you have both done me faithful service, and while you are guests aboard my flagship, you must be civil toward each other, and dine together with me.” Abreha turned to Telemakos and commanded, “Show this man a sign of your goodwill.”
Telemakos held out his single hand to Anako, palm down, a gesture of sure and cold command. Anako hesitated, glancing up at Telemakos in disdain and disbelief. Telemakos turned his hand slightly, so that its slant presented the two scarred fingertips; that was where Anako had maimed him. There was another scar on his shoulder where Anako had tried to kill him.
Telemakos saw that the hateful, cringing man before him did not recognize the wounds or remember inflicting them. Anako looked blankly past the uneven fingernails, focused simply on the distasteful task of giving Telemakos some formal greeting of respect.
“I remember you,” Anako hissed. “You sentenced me.”
“Anako of Deire,” the najashi said grimly, “was he not merciful in his sentence? Are you not alive, and free, and whole? Might he not have sent you to your death? The Morningstar has offered you his respect. Make your peace.”