by Rj Barker
“The windspires,” shouted Meas above the roaring wind, clawing hair from her face, “they are part of them.” As she said it the end of the spire on the keyshan started to glow, and a similar glow appeared on the head of every keyshan that filled the sea around them, a flotilla of massive bodies with glowing lights above them.
“Must leave ship before end,” said the Gullaime. “All must go. All but one. All who stay die.”
“What do you mean?” shouted Joron.
“Leave,” screeched the Gullaime and she danced in a circle, frustrated. “One must stay, shut door.”
“You mean kill you?” said Meas, fighting to be heard over the gale. The Gullaime danced forward, then stood before her, low to the deck, before raising herself to her full height.
“Already dead,” said the Gullaime, “Windseer start, already dead. Power build. This ship, us, centre. Fire and water.” She blinked her glowing eyes. “Ship woman. Deckchild. Joron Twiner. All must leave but one.”
“Gullaime, we—” began Joron but it interrupted.
“Not have time!” she screeched. “Look, look!” He turned, ships were closing on them from three sides, powered by the unnatural wind of the keyshans. Behind them the fleet that had followed them through the islands, to seaward a Gaunt Islands fleet and to landward, much nearer, the Hundred Isles fleet headed by the Arakeesian Dread. And before them, the Northstorm rushing toward them as fast as they rushed toward it. All unnatural. All strange, the light of Skearith’s Eye no longer bright, but bathing them in a violet unlike any colour Joron had ever seen. A finger of dark cloud reached out from the storm toward them. “Quick quick,” shouted the Gullaime and for a moment even Meas seemed frozen by the onrushing cloud, the strangeness of the light, the feeling of power that crackled through the air. Then she was moving.
“Signals! Topboy, make signal, have the nearest ship come to us.” As she shouted the weather became even rougher, the Northstorm nearer. Rain started, a cold and freezing downpour. Lightning cut the air and thunder crashed.
“Brownbone coming in!”
“Farys!” shouted Joron, and it was, she had taken command of the brownbone she rode in, bringing it near to Tide Child, already flukeboats were launching from it.
“Get our boat in the water, Tide Child will need a skeleton crew! Only volunteers, mind!”
Joron felt a scratching on his arm and he turned, the Gullaime stood by him.
“Must make sure, Joron Twiner. Must close door.”
“You are my friend, I cannot kill you,” the words tore at him, cut deep as any wound.
“Already dead.”
“What?”
“Fire and death.”
“I don’t understand, Gullaime.”
“Only stop pain, Joron Twiner.” She blinked. Touched her chest. “Power grows. Fire inside.”
“What you do will hurt?” The Gullaime looked at him, and nodded, then she reached inside her robe and took out her chick, passed her to him.
“Keep safe,” she said.
“But Gullaime,” he began as he tucked the tiny, squawking and complaining windtalker inside his stinker coat. The Gullaime no longer listened. She was standing on the tips of her claws, and with a shake she shed her colourful robe and stood before them, naked to Joron’s way of thinking. She took his breath away, took all their breath away. Along her head a raised red and black crest, and the feathers of her body were a midnight blue, shining and glinting in the strange light, festooned with diamonds of moisture. That same midnight blue ran along the edges of her wings, huge wings that she stretched out, tested with a few soft flaps. The primary flight feathers were gold and bronze and breathtaking. Behind her strong legs stretched out a great tail of feathers that seemed to wink and look at him from a million blue and green feathered eyes. The windtalker turned her head to him, those burning eyes focusing on him.
“Goodbye, Joron Twiner. Good friend,” she said. Then she began to beat her wings, huge, powerful motions. It had no effect at first. She called out, and Joron felt the familiar heat and pressure in his ears of the wind coming at the Gullaime’s call and she began to rise into the air, getting faster and higher and higher and faster. From the deck behind him the acolytes also shed their robes to show feathers as pure and white as ice. They too flapped their wings and rose into the air. And from ships around them came more gullaime, as if there was a call that some of them could simply not refuse. All rising, flying out to meet the finger of dark cloud from the Northstorm. Tide Child’s glorious, colourful gullaime led her flock and when they met the finger of cloud he heard the Gullaime, their Gullaime, call out. Heard her familiar voice and all the gullaime of the fleet answered, as did the keyshans. Such a noise as he had never heard. The glowing points of the windspires on the heads of the sea dragons became brighter. Another squall of noise and every keyshan was joined to the one behind it by a line of light. A web around the ships that focused on one keyshan, at the head of their school. The greatest of them all. A vast mountain of a creature that rose out of the water far ahead of the fleet, water cascading down its sides. Every colour Joron had ever seen flashing down its body in a constant, hypnotic rhythm. The light above its head became so bright it hurt to look at. Then that same light leapt into the sky, a direct line from the keyshans around them to this sovereign creature and from there up to where the Gullaime hung in the sky like a jewel, on the point of being swallowed by the reaching black clouds of the Northstorm.
And the clouds blew apart.
A crack of air like the thunder of a million lightning strikes at once.
Fire in the sky.
First only a point of light from where their Gullaime was, then it grew, linking all the gullaime who had taken flight and creating the outline of a huge and fiery bird in the sky. Outside of the firebird the storm raged but within was open, flat and calm sea, a sea that dragged Meas’s fleet forward into it, and as Tide Child entered he was held, along with Farys’s brownbone, as if by a great hand.
“Off!” shouted Meas. “Abandon ship!”
All was action, crew piling into boats and rowing or flying hard for Farys’s brownbone as the enemy ships bore down in them, until only boat one was left, waiting for the officers. They heard a crash, and the ropes holding the boat snapped. A moment later they saw it and the small crew Farys had sent sucked away, dashed to pieces on a wave. At the same time, the brownbone took aboard the last flukeboat; Joron saw Aelerin struggle onto the deck and saw Farys, pointing at Tide Child. Then the brownbone swung round, the gullaime on its deck driving it toward Tide Child.
“No,” shouted Meas, “it is too risky!” but her words were whipped away by the wind and the boat came on. Grapples were loosed, catching on to Tide Child and the crew of the brownbone began to pull the two ships together beneath the silhouette of the burning bird above them.
“Joron!” shouted Meas through the howling wind. “You must leave, go to the brownbone, whoever stays to finish this will be consumed by the storm or taken by the Dread!” She pointed behind them, the massive five-ribber closing in, undeterred by the storm or the beasts in the sea around it.
“No!” he shouted back. “I will stay, you must go!”
“I am old, Joron, you are young, go!”
“No,” he said, and ripped the scarf from his face, showing her the sores and marks of the rot. “I am dying, Meas. We both know it.”
“I have given you an order,” she screamed it at him, “an order!” He smiled, his ruined face hurting as seawater and rain hit the sores, as his skin cracked where it had scabbed over.
“And,” he shouted back, water slicking his face, “it is the deckkeeper’s place to tell his shipwife when she is wrong!”
She stared at him then, it seemed for far too long, though it may only have been a second, a moment within the maelstrom.
“You are no deckkeeper,” she shouted, and dashed the one tailed hat from his head. He felt shocked, hurt, insulted, but for a moment only, then huge pride
welled within him as she pulled the two-tail from her head. The symbol of command she had once taken from him, by force, and she pushed it onto his head, hard, so it jammed on the soaking braids of his hair. “You are a shipwife, Joron Twiner, and you are the finest I have ever known.” Words failed him, had her face not been soaked with spray and rain he would have thought her crying, had his face not been soaked with spray and rain she would have seen his tears.
“I had the best teacher,” he shouted back. Then before she could speak he carried on. “Now, get off my deck, off! And take this bird with you!” He pulled Shorn from her hiding place within his jacket and the tiny gullaime squawked and yarked in fury at the insult of the cold and rain as he passed her over to Meas, who nestled the chick into her coat.
“I once said, Twiner,” she shouted, “that people like me do not have friends. I was wrong.”
“Go!” he shouted, and he had to fight for his voice not to break. “Go now!” She looked at him, one last shared glance. “That is an order!” She nodded, then ran to the side of the boat, grabbed a rope and swung across to the brownbone.
He turned, found Cwell stood behind him.
“Go,” he shouted.
“My place is by—”
“No!” He ripped his sword from its scabbard, grabbed Cwell’s hand and pressed the hilt into it. “Take this, we both know I will only lose it without you.” Cwell looked at him, seemed surprised. “Use it, keep Meas safe for me.”
“You made my life worthwhile.”
“Then,” he shouted over the roaring wind, “do not waste it! Go!” She stared a moment more, then gave the smallest of nods.
“Ey, Shipwife,” she said and then she was gone. Over the side and onto the brownbone.
A second later it released the grapples, raised its wings, caught the wind and moved away from Tide Child. The black ship stayed in place, held by the same powerful wind that had opened the door in the storm. Joron looked behind, the ships of the Hundred and Gaunt Isles were in the tunnel of cloud, bearing down on him, funnelled together by the howling wind. At the front of the combined fleet was the massive Arakeesian Dread. Joron looked for’ard, at his fleet. All around them the vast and shining bodies of the keyshans, powering through the storm, the raised spines on their heads glowing with eerie blue light as they surrounded the ships. He saw his crew on the rump of the brownbone, staring back. Meas looked old now. Old and hurt and haggard as she held up Shorn, the baby gullaime, so she could see her. By her was Farys, young and full of hope and fight, she held her infant daughter tight to her chest with one hand. He saluted them, not knowing if they could see him or not through the storm that whirled around them. But he felt sure he saw some movement, a return of his salute, in the moment before they were pulled on and out and through the tunnel of cloud. Then they were gone into the winds with an escort of sea dragons, to lands he would never know. To places he hoped would be so much better.
He ran up the deck, toward the gallowbow, Solemn Muffaz, and as he worked in the howling wind, untrussing and spinning, he felt a presence behind him. Turned to find Garriya, dragging a heavy bolt over.
“You should be with them,” he shouted over the gale. He took the bolt from her.
“This is my world,” she shouted back. With a grunt he slotted the bolt home in the gallowbow and started to pull it into its highest elevation. Centring it on the burning figure of the Gullaime and, even though she had said she was dead the moment this started, he did not know if he could do it. To have already lost so much, and then to be the one who murdered his friend. He felt weak. Broken. Like this was more than he could bear.
“Strength, Shipwife,” said Garriya, “it is time.”
“I cannot, they have not had long enough to be out, and—”
He felt Garriya’s hand on his arm.
“The keyshans guard them now, they will be fine. They will build a new world and, we must hope, a better one. We must close the door on this one or we will be too late, and they,” she pointed behind them, at the encroaching fleet, the massive Arakeesian Dread, “will take their poison through.” He looked up, at the fire in the sky, the great burning wings and the constant crackling roar of the vast firebird filling the air. The Gullaime at the head of it. In the sights of his bow.
“My friend,” he said. “I never even knew your real name.” The words paralysed him. “I cannot do this alone.”
“You are not alone, Caller,” said Garriya. “We are all here.” He turned, found Tide Child transformed. Across the deck, the rails, the ropes and every spar and wing ran flame, and yet it did not burn. This was not the same furious, hot flame that burned a hole in the storm or the vicious heat of hagspit that ate away the bone of a ship. This was a warm, blue comforting flame, and out of it, formed from it, came figures, gauzy, hazy, but with enough about them for him to recognise them. There was Shipwife Arrin who had died protecting Safeharbour, and there was Turrimore and Adrantchi. There was Anzir, killed in Cwell’s mutiny, and by her Narza, and so many more, so many friends and faces that he had lost. With great joy he recognised the hazy form of Solemn Muffaz, massive in the back. And right at the centre, gathered closest to Garriya, Mevans, smiling at him, and with him was Dinyl, who saluted, his restored hand held over his heart and Joron could barely speak. Amid them all, closest to Garriya, was the Gullaime, twirling and dancing about the old woman and, watching her dance, a smile on his bearded face and his arm about a woman Joron did not know but felt sure he recognised, was Joron’s father. Garriya reached out her hand.
“It is time, Shipwife,” she said. “Take my hand and come warm yourself at my fire,” and her voice was as gentle and welcoming as any Joron had ever heard.
“Ey,” he said, and he pulled the trigger cord, felt the jerk of the gallowbow as the bolt escaped it. He watched it arc into the sky, saw it hit a tiny figure and the fire that had burned so brightly went out. The shape of the great bird dissipating as the frail bodies that had made it up fell into the sea until only the Gullaime’s body was left, pierced by the bolt, somehow held in the sky. It became a point of brightness, impossible to look at. Then it became fire, raging, out of control, billowing out toward him. He looked back. Saw the tunnel closing, clouds rushing in, wind smashing ships. The Arakeesian Dread being overwhelmed by a huge wave, and he turned away from it all, from the death and the war. He took the old woman’s hand. Smiled at those gathered around her.
“I am coming,” he said as the fire reached out and surrounded him. “I am coming.”
And for the first time in so long, the pain ceased.
The Song of Lucky Meas
She flew across the world
Bird passed her through a storm so
The Tide Child came ‘n binded
Cwell there right beside her
Wise but melancholy rule
“Those left behind I miss so.”
Our people they call out
“Children to the ships!”
And the sea it all cries out.
Shipwife Meas, you are missed.
Epilogue
The water was kissed with light, a thousand little bright points and she sang. Further out a keshun basked, its huge bulk almost as big as Home Island and Meyans thought that, when it was cooler, she may take the children over to it, the inshore sea dragons were safe and kept free of tunir. Or they may just swim instead, the waters were always warm and clear of danger around the seamothers. But not now, Gullam’s Eye was at its zenith and it was becoming too hot for the baby, Fras, to be out in the sun, so Meyans brought the baby and the twins, Jeron and Mees, into the cabin.
“Why is the eye so hot, Mother?” said Jeron.
“Because it is the eye of a god, Jeron.” The small girl squinted up at the cloudless blue sky.
“It does not look like an eye,” said her twin, Mees.
“Well, it is.”
“How did it get up there?” said Jeron.
“Well,” said Mayans, “the story of how the world came
to be, of the Maiden, Mother and Hag, and the man who died to save them, is a very long story.”
“Will you tell us the story, Mother?” said Mees.
Meyans sighed, there was always work to be done on the deck. But it was hot, and the dekeper and her mate were sunning themselves on the roof of the cabin. Meyans could hear them gently cooing and chirping to one another. She sat back against the cushion in the small cabin and fanned herself with a gift of their discarded feathers, smiling as cold air moved over the sweat around her neck. Far toward the horizon the massive form of another keshun moved across the sea and Meyans thought that all was good and all was well in her world. Her husband had been right, this was the perfect sort of day to take the children out to fish. Then she wondered if he was fretting back in Safabbar, or if he was enjoying the peace and quiet. Most likely enjoying the quiet of an empty bothy, she thought.
“Please Mother,” said Jeron. “The story.” Meyans smiled, and as she knew it would be hours before the nets were ready to be pulled up.
“Very well,” she said, “get yourself comfortable and I will begin.” She sat and let the children squirm and fidget on the cushions until they were happy and would stay still for at least long enough for her to make a start. “Right,” she said, “are you ready?”
The twins nodded.
“Good, now, these are not the sort of words you expect to start a legend. But these are the first words he heard her say. ‘Give me your hat…’”