Map of Plagues

Chapter 2

2

The rocky beach was busy even in the small hours of the morning. Fishermen readied their boats and traders joked with one another as they warmed their hands by braziers, beacons of flame against the dark. A woman in a black headscarf squatted on her haunches on the stones in front of a fire, her hands shaping balls of dough into smooth round shapes which she threw on the coals with practiced skill. The smell of fresh flatbreads mingled with the tang of smoke and salt in the air.

Finn Page wrapped his thick cloak more tightly around himself, scant protection against the cold wind blowing in from the sea, but more as a shield against anyone recognizing him. His face was on Wanted posters all over the northern Borderland towns but down here, on the very edge of the Uncharted, he should be safe. People here tended to turn a blind eye, since many were also amongst the wanted themselves. He had escaped through the network of the Resistance, but he couldn’t stay anywhere for long, not wanting to draw down the wrath of his father on those who sheltered him.

Finn leaned back against the wooden spars of the jetty, gazing toward the horizon and the faint glimmer of dawn. The sun would rise whatever happened to him. The world turned regardless of whether his life ended in the dungeons of the Shadow Cartographers.

He thought of Sienna on the other side of the map and wondered whether she thought of him at all. Time moved differently out here and the kiss they had shared as the border closed had begun to fade in his memory now. It was crazy to think that he could love an Earthsider, that they could ever find common ground. But Sienna gave him hope that things could be mended somehow, her optimism as yet unshaken by the Shadow.

A light flashed out in the gloom, a lamp held aloft by new arrivals. Another lifeboat filled with refugees rejected from Earthside. They had chosen to leave their homeland for fear of death and chaos, but they were not wanted by anyone else. As each nation turned them away, they became lost on the seas and flickered over the border. These last few months, they had arrived in their thousands, spirits broken by the journey and constant rejection from those who should have let them stay.

Finn understood the feeling of loss. Since he had stepped through the portal in Bath, turned his back on that glorious city and Sienna, he had been running from his father, the Warlord of Old Aleppo. His father threatened death for his betrayal, but more than punishment, Finn regretted the loss of his home. The sweet smell of oranges from the market as he sipped strong coffee with his friends, the stacks of his father’s library filled with contraband books, walking for hours through the streets of a city he had grown up in and knew every corner of. He even missed his father’s laugh as he played with his younger children. The Warlord was a pleasure-loving family man when he was not away slaughtering his enemies — and perhaps now there was hope.

In the last few days, Finn had heard through his Resistance contacts that the Warlord talked of amnesty, a willingness to trade. Finn could live safely in one of the lesser Borderland cities, his niece, Emily, would be returned to him, rescued from the Halbrasse training camps. They would be left alone to live in peace. It sounded like an impossible dream, a tranquil life where he could raise his niece in memory of her mother, Isabel. He had promised to keep Emily safe as his sister took her dying breath, but now that promise haunted him. Finn gripped his sword, knuckles white with tension. He was a warrior, always had been, always would be. While he wanted a better life for Emily than the halls of the Halbrasse, he also couldn’t see himself tending orchards in the outer cities for the rest of his life.

But he had to know more about his possible future, so he was here, ready to meet with a messenger from his father. The rocky beach served well as a public place where he could slip into the shadows if it looked like a trap. The bounty on his head was still worth collecting, after all.

The sound of oars paddling grew louder than the waves as the lifeboat drew closer to the shore, hollow-cheeked men onboard still rowing with tired arms. They wore layers of stained and ragged clothes, pockets filled with what little they could carry from their homeland. Some wore hats pulled low over their eyes as if to shield the world from their sight. Finn glimpsed the drawn face of a beautiful young woman clutching a silent baby boy in her arms, her big dark eyes staring toward an unknown shore.

The traders readied themselves on the rocks, jostling for position, ready to guide the travelers to what they thought was safety.

But Finn knew what really awaited these people.

This was not the coast of some welcoming haven where refugees would be helped into a new life. This was the Borderlands, where those pushed off the edge of the map ended up in forgotten places, where history remained in the present, and the extinct lived on. It was ruled by the Shadow Cartographers, those who could wield dark magic, who bred a new generation focused on taking back the land they believed was theirs. Earthside, where Sienna lived, where a whole world of people lived their lives with no idea that the Borderlands or the Uncharted even existed.

Finn watched the new arrivals. They would learn soon enough.

The boat beached on the shore with the grating sound of metal over stone. The traders helped people out, guiding them up the bank, funneling them toward the soldiers who waited on the crest of the hill above, faces painted with the half-moon of the Shadow. The new arrivals spoke the names of their home towns, the places they had fled for fear of their lives, hoping for news of home, of family, of those who had left before them. Those on the beach merely shook their heads, denying any knowledge.

Soldiers singled out the ones who might be especially useful. One pointed at the beautiful young woman, proof of her ability to breed held in her arms. One of the traders pulled her away from the group.

She turned, calling out to an older man. “Papa!”

The man started up the beach toward his daughter. “Wait, what are you doing?”

He pulled papers from his jeans, the sodden pages almost legible. He thrust them at the soldier, but the man brushed them away, the papers fluttering to the floor. “These are worthless now.”

One of the traders pulled the old man roughly back. “Leave her. She is no longer yours.”

“No!” The old man struggled but more of the traders piled in, punched him to the ground, kicked him as the girl was dragged away screaming, the baby crying, the sound of lamentation in the air.

Finn closed his eyes against their suffering and clenched his fists as he tried to hold himself back. There were too many for him to fight alone and he had no friends here. The girl would probably end up in the breeding halls where his sister had died in a bloody dungeon not so long ago, buried in the mass grave behind the Castle of the Shadow. The girl’s father would probably die in the mines of the Uncharted. This is what the Resistance fought against, but they needed a whole lot more help to overthrow the power of the Shadow Cartographers and he could not fight this battle alone.

As the traders stripped the boat for parts, the refugees were herded away. By the time the sun rose above the horizon, the only thing left on the beach was a child’s doll, choked with seaweed, trampled into the sand.

Finn turned to see the willowy figure of a woman standing alone on the jetty, black hair loose, swirling about her in the wind like the snakes of Medusa. She carried twin crossed swords on her back and her face was marked with the half-moon. As the rays of dawn touched the jetty with a golden glow, Finn recognized her. Jari, one of the Warlord’s trusted bodyguards, renowned for her skill with the sword and her brutality in battle. They had trained together in their younger days, matched in skill on the battlefield — and in their passion afterwards. She was even more beautiful now with the scars she wore with pride. Finn remembered the shape of her muscled body beneath that cloak. He could still recall the warmth of her. He shook his head. His father knew him too well.

He watched Jari from the shadows, waiting for any sense that she wasn’t alone. Minutes passed and she stared resolutely out to sea, her cloak flapping in the breeze.

Finn stepped out into the open, hand on his sword, checking around him for danger.

Jari looked over. “I came alone, as promised.” Her eyes flashed with a dark smile. “Besides, if I wanted to take you, I would. I hear you’re out of practice, Finn.”

She sat down, long legs swinging off the edge of the jetty. She seemed relaxed but Finn was still wary. She was right, he had been running and hiding for too long, and his sword arm was out of practice. Jari could probably even beat him in hand-to-hand combat, but he hoped they wouldn’t have to try that right here.

“What does my father want?”

Jari paused for a moment, her dark eyes raking over his body as if she remembered those nights years ago as well as he did.

“The Shadow Cartographers seek pieces of an ancient map that show the way to an island lost in time, pushed out into the far Uncharted.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

Jari raised an eyebrow. “The Warlord knows of your love for Earthsiders and they will come soon looking for your help to find the pieces of this map. We have one fragment already and they will do anything to find the rest.”

Finn’s heart raced at the thought of Sienna coming over the border again. He would see her once more. But he could not betray her. If the Mapwalkers needed the ancient map, then it must have power to destroy something on Earthside. He turned toward the ocean, the frown deepening between his eyes.

“I can’t—”

Jari cut him off. “Your baby niece has no magic.”

Finn spun back to face her. “What? How do you know? She is too young to face the test.”

Jari jumped off the jetty and walked toward him, her gait swaying slightly as if she danced across the rocks. Finn grasped the pommel of his sword and she gave a half-smile at his gesture, like a cat toying with its prey.

“There is one whose magic is knowing gifts early, reading the blood of the newborns to see where their talents lie. To see who is worth keeping.”

Finn flinched at the thought of little Emily’s blood taken for a dark purpose.

Jari walked closer. “Do you know what they do with those who have no magic in the Castle of the Shadow?”

Her words were soft, menacing.

Finn closed his eyes, recalling the thick stone walls of the dungeon, the bodies of the dead, the Blood Gallery, the torture chambers — and the mass graves of those considered worthless to the cause.

He sighed and nodded slowly.

Jari put her hand on his arm and looked up at him with a half-smile on her lips. “She is safe, looked after by the wet nurses, kept from the blood pits — for now. She’ll be returned to your care if you bring the three missing pieces of the Map of Plagues to your father in Old Aleppo by the end of the next half-moon. You can raise her in peace, your transgressions forgiven.” She shrugged. “Who knows, maybe Kosai will want to play happy families. After all, she is his granddaughter.”

Finn spun round, shaking off her hand, his face contorted with anger. “That bastard sent his own daughter to the Castle of the Shadow. Do you know what happens to women in those breeding halls? Women like you?”

Jari laughed in his face. “Not like me. Your sister was weak, easily broken. The question is whether you are, too.”

She was so close that Finn could smell the mint tea on her breath, see the pores of her skin, sense the latent strength of her body. How he wished to fight her now, see her proud face in the dust, but what she offered would fulfill the vow he had made to Isabel as she lay in a pool of her own blood. He promised to look after Emily and he could not storm the castle by force. He had tried before and been vanquished by mere children trying out their newfound magic.

Finn stepped back, giving ground before meeting her eyes. “If I do this, then I want safe passage for the Mapwalker team. I will find the pieces of the map but they must be allowed to return to Earthside afterwards.”

Jari hesitated a moment, then nodded. “The Shadow Cartographers want the Map of Plagues, not the people you have a fondness for. Their fate is sealed, regardless, like all those on Earthside.”

Finn could only hope that her words were empty, that there would be a way to prevent disaster, but for now, he had to move toward saving Emily. He would figure out the rest later, with Sienna by his side.

“Then I’ll do it.”

Jari smiled again. “There is just one more condition.”