“She is a true dragon, and the Empress, and you will speak of her with respect!”
An echoing silence followed his words.
“Sir,” John added, belatedly.
“It is clear,” the Knight-Commander said, sounding as though he was speaking through gritted teeth, “that you have walked on two legs for too long, Knight-Poet. You are acting like a human.”
Coming from anyone else, it would have been a killing insult, one demanding a duel to the death. But this was the Knight-Commander, to whom John had sworn all his oaths in the Emperor’s absence. He was the Voice of the Emperor-in-Absence. It was his right to rebuke his knights when they erred.
As, apparently, John had.
His shamed silence seemed to mollify the Knight-Commander somewhat. “I am your commander, and you have sworn your loyalty to me. Whatever else you may have done in a…moment of passion, I know that you will not break that oath. Return to Atlantis. We must discuss this matter in person, mind to mind.”
The habit of obedience was so strong, he was physically shaking with the effort of staying still. “I cannot leave the Empress unguarded, sir.”
“Given that she has successfully survived her entire life to date without you standing over her, I believe she can last another few days.”
“Sir, it would be most fitting to dispatch an honor-guard to-“ John began.
“I do not have anyone to spare at the moment,” the Knight-Commander interrupted curtly. “I already have half the Order scouring the seas for the Master Shark. I cannot weaken Atlantis’s defenses any further.”
John’s brow furrowed. “The Lord of Sharks is missing, sir?”
“He stood up in the middle of a delicate diplomatic meeting last night and strode out without a word, scattering the assembled dignitaries as though he’d just scented blood in the water. The entire Council is in an uproar, and demanding that I locate him immediately so that the negotiations can resume. That is why I was originally trying to contact you.”
“Me, sir?” John said, startled. “Why?”
The Knight-Commander was the most skilled Seer in the sea. To him, every drop of rain was an eye, every puddle was an ear. John’s own art-form of poetry was of much less use when it came to finding a missing person. He was at a loss as to why the Knight-Commander would need his help.
“Your place is not to ask why, Knight-Poet. Just to obey. If I want you back in Atlantis, then you will come.”
The Knight-Commander was a formidable strategist, both on the battlefield and in the arena of politics. He must have some use in mind for John’s particular talents. But John himself could not even begin to grasp what it might be. He still didn’t see what the Master Shark’s disappearance could possibly have to do with him…
Wait.
Last night?
As if he’d scented blood in the water, the Knight-Commander had said. John knew that was no idle metaphor. Shark shifters could follow the scent of their prey’s blood, under the water and over it. Unlike ordinary sharks, however, they could do so even when that blood had not yet been spilled.
And they were particularly drawn to power. The scent of a particularly strong, unusual shifter could catch the attention of sharks for miles around. More than once in the course of his duties, John had had reason to curse shark shifters’ abilities. As a sea d
ragon knight, his own blood-scent could be picked up by even the weakest sharks from fifty miles away.
And I am just the least and lowest of the Knights of the First Water. How far away could they sense a sea dragon of true power?
John’s heartbeat pounded in his ears. “Sir? Do you happen to know the limit of the Master Shark’s range, when it comes to tracking prey?”
The Knight-Commander looked at him curiously. “As far as I am aware, he has none. He is the Master of his kind, after all. Why?”
John opened his fist, looking down at the pearl in his hand. Neridia’s pearl, the Emperor’s pearl that blocked all forms of locating magic, which had never left her neck…
Until last night.
Chapter 14
“John?” Neridia rolled over, roused from her fitful dreams by a breeze over her bare shoulder. Rubbing bleary, sleep-sodden eyes, she sat up. “What is it?”
The hulking figure at the open window straightened, turning.