The Complete Liveship Traders Trilogy: Ship of Magic, The Mad Ship, Ship of Destiny. Robin Hobb
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Ronica did not hesitate. She lied. ‘That might be so, if such charts still existed. But they do not, Kyle. Ephron destroyed all charts of the Rain River years ago, when he decided to sever our trade connections there. He wanted to put an end to the Vestrit family trading up the Rain River. And he did.’
Kyle shot to his feet. ‘I don’t believe it!’ he snarled. ‘Ephron was not a fool, and only a fool would destroy charts that valuable. You’re keeping them back from us, aren’t you? Saving them for precious Althea and whatever you can find to marry her?’
‘I don’t care to be called a liar,’ Ronica hissed. That, at least, was truth.
‘And I don’t care to be treated like a fool!’ Kyle raged in return. ‘No one in this family has ever given me the respect I deserve. I was willing to endure it from old Ephron. He was a man and years my senior. But I will not tolerate it from anyone else under this roof. Once and for all, I want the truth. Why did Ephron sever the family trading contacts up the Rain River, and what will it take for us to recover them?’
Ronica merely looked at him.
‘Damn it, woman, can’t you see? What is the point of having a liveship if we don’t use it to exploit the River-trade? Everyone knows that only liveship families can trade up the Rain Wild. We’re a liveship Old Trader family, and what has your husband done with that privilege and that debt? He’s traded in silks and brandies, as could anyone with a raft and a sail, and watched our debt grow larger every year. Money flows down the Rain River faster than its waters do, and yet you’d have us stand on the banks of it and starve.’
‘There are worse things than starving, Kyle Haven,’ Ronica heard herself say.
‘Like what?’ he demanded.
She could not stop herself. ‘Like having a greedy fool for a son-in-law. You don’t know what you’re talking about when you speak of the Rain River.’
Kyle gave her an icy smile. ‘Why don’t you give me the charts then, and let me find out? If you’re right, you’ll be rid of me as a son-in-law. You’ll be free to sink all your children and grandchildren into debt.’
‘No!’ Keffria started up with a shriek. ‘I can’t stand this! Don’t talk about things like that. Kyle, you mustn’t go up the Rain River. Slaves are far better, trade in slaves, and take Wintrow with you if you must, but you mustn’t go up the Rain River!’ She looked at them both pleadingly. ‘He would never come back. We both know that. Papa’s only just died and now you’re talking about letting Kyle get himself killed.’
‘Keffria. You’re overwrought, and over-reacting to everything.’ The look Kyle shot Ronica suggested it was her fault for playing upon her daughter’s imagination. A tiny spark of anger kindled in Ronica’s heart, but she doused it firmly, for her daughter was looking at her husband with eyes full of hurt. Opportunity, she breathed to herself. Opportunity.
‘Let me take care of her,’ she suggested smoothly to Kyle. ‘I’m sure you have so much to do to ready the ship. Come, Keffria. Let’s go to my sitting room. I’ll have Rache bring us some tea. In truth, I feel a bit overwrought myself. Come. Let’s leave things to Kyle for a while.’
She stood and slipped an arm around Keffria and led her from the room. Salvage, she silently whispered to Ephron. I’ll salvage what I can of what you left me, my dear. At least one daughter I shall keep safe by me.
11 CONSEQUENCES AND REFLECTIONS
‘AND IF I WISHED to dispute these documents?’ Althea asked slowly. She tried to make her voice impartially calm, but inside she was quivering with both anger and hurt.
Curtil scratched reluctantly at what was left of his greying hair. ‘That is specifically provided for. Anyone who disputes this last testament is automatically excluded from benefiting from it.’ He shook his head, almost apologetically. ‘It’s a standard thing,’ he told her gently. ‘It’s not as if your father was thinking specifically of you when we wrote it.’
She looked up from her tangled hands and met his eyes firmly. ‘And you believe this is actually what he wished? That Kyle take over Vivacia, and I be dependent on my sister’s charity?’
‘Well, I doubt that is how he envisioned it,’ Curtil said judiciously. He took a sip of his tea. Althea wondered if that were a delaying tactic, to give him time to think. The old man straightened in his chair as if he’d decided something. ‘But I do believe he knew his own mind. No one deceived him or coerced him. I would never have been a party to that. Your father wished to see your sister as his sole heir. He did not desire to punish you, but rather to safeguard his entire family.’
‘Well, in both of those desires he failed,’ Althea said harshly. Then she lowered her face into her hands, ashamed to have spoken so of her father. Curtil let her be. When she lifted her face some time later, she observed, ‘You must think me a carrion bird. Yesterday my father died, and today I come quarrelling for a share of what was his.’
Curtil offered her his handkerchief and she took it gratefully. ‘No. No, I don’t think that. When the mainstay of one’s world is taken away, it’s only natural to cling to all the rest, to try desperately to keep things as close to the way they were as one can.’ He shook his head sorrowfully. ‘But no one can ever go back to yesterday.’
‘No. I suppose not.’ She sighed heavily. She considered her last pathetic straw of hope. ‘Trader Curtil. By Bingtown law, if a man swears an oath to Sa, cannot he be held to that oath as a legal contract?’
Curtil’s long brow furrowed. ‘Well. It depends. If in a fit of anger, in a tavern, I say that by Sa, I’m going to kill so-and-so, well, that’s not a legal action in the first place, so…’
Althea stopped mincing words. ‘If Kyle Haven swore before witnesses that if I could produce proof that I was a worthy seaman, he would give Vivacia back to me, if he swore that in Sa’s name, could it be enforced?’
‘Well, technically, the ship is your sister’s property, not his—’
‘She has ceded control of it over to him,’ Althea said impatiently. ‘Is such an oath legally binding?’
Curtil shrugged. ‘You’d end up before the Traders’ Council, but, yes, I think you’d win. They’re conservative, the old customs count for much with them. An oath sworn before Sa would have to be legally honoured. You have witnesses to this, at least two?’
Althea leaned back in her chair with a sigh. ‘One, perhaps, who would speak up for the truth of what I say. The other two… I no longer know any more what I could expect of my mother and sister.’
Curtil shook his head. ‘Family disputes such as these are such messy things. I counsel you not to pursue this, Althea. It can only lead to even worse rifts.’
‘I do not believe that it can get any worse,’ she observed grimly, before bidding him farewell.
She was her father’s daughter. She had gone immediately to Curtil in his offices. The old man had not seemed at all surprised to see her. As soon as she was shown into his chambers, he rose and took down several rolled documents. One after another, he set them before her, and made plain to her just how untenable her position was. She had to give her mother credit for thoroughness; the whole thing was lashed down like storm-weather cargo. Legally, she had nothing. Legally, she was dependent entirely on her sister’s goodwill.
Legally. She did not intend that her reality would have anything to do with that kind of legality. She would not live off Keffria’s charity, especially not if it meant she would have to dance to Kyle’s tunes. No. Let them go on thinking her father had died and left her nothing. They’d be wrong. All he had taught her, all her knowledge of the sailing trade and her observations of his trading were still hers. If she could not make her own way on that, then she deserved