Lejo worries. His mind goes down fifteen flights of stairs into a warren of secret rooms and passageways. But only love and kindness live down there. He’s the most gentle person I know. Even on my worst days, when I do the stupidest things, I know Lejo always loves me. The time I left the nyellem door open and Da whipped me in front of the crew, I didn’t let anyone see me cry afterward except Lejo.
Biting the corner of a sudden smile, Trueblood imagined a future Cay with himself at the helm, Raj and Lejo on either side. His pilot and his boatswain. His two compasses. His pen moved across the page, experimenting with a third-person narrative that might be told a hundred years from now.
When Kepten Trueblood needed direction, he sent for Raj. When the heart of Trueblood was troubled, he sent for Lejo.
Raj and Lejo had no memory of their origins and neither seemed to care where their mysterious ship came from.
Trueblood tried asking the older crew members who would’ve been with Kepten True at the time—Abrakam, Rafil or the Sisters. Oddly, none of their answers matched. They put the twins’ ship in five different waters and described it five different ways. The only consistent aspect of their separate recollections was a distracted, almost dreamy expression in the telling.
When Trueblood asked his father about finding the Ĝemelos, the Kepten took on that same abstracted look.
“It was right after we rescued Tehvan il-Kheir in Altynai,” he said. “We came across the ship and found Raj and Lejo. It was remarkable.”
Each time, Trueblood waited for more. Sure more details would be forthcoming.
“Remarkable and wonderful,” True said, his gold eyes looking through the air and into next week.
That was it.
That was his only version of the story.
Of course, legantos, the truth has a reason for disguising herself in five different costumes.
She’ll tell you the tale. Just remember it’s not always best to know the truth when others don’t.
Twelve years earlier
It was a chore to keep the Cay’s minoro crew out of the cabin where Tehvan il-Kheir lay. Few had ever seen a kheiron before, and none had seen one in pure human form.
“Where’s his horse half?” they asked Abrakam. “He’s supposed to look like you.”
“He can look like whatever he wants,” Abrakam said. “That’s what makes him a kheiron. Now run along. Leave him be.”
No sooner had one youth been shooed out than another snuck in, wide-eyed and full of questions.
“Where are his wings?”
“They’re put away,” the centaur said. “Does it look like he should be flying now? Stop hovering over him. And don’t touch that.”
“What is it?”
“It’s kyrrh and it’s not for you to muck with. Put it down and go back to work.”
Shaking his head, the centaur turned around, and now Seven’s questioning face looked up at him. “What was he doing in Altynai?”
“We don’t know, lad. He was stolen away from his family two years ago and disappeared. Then the Altyns found him.”
“Where was he?”
“In a tree.”
“I mean before that?”
“We don’t know.”
“How did he get hurt?”
“Out,” Abrakam roared through clenched teeth. “I don’t have the answers to everything.”
The kheiron burned with fever, his shattered legs neither improving or worsening, only holding him in a fixed place of pain. He lay in one of the cabins within the foyer of the aftercastle. When the crew gathered for evening stories, the young ones insisted Tehvan’s door be kept open.
“He’ll want to hear, too.”
To honor their suffering guest and assuage the crew’s curiosity, Abrakam read from the Truviad that evening, retelling the story of the first kheirons.
“The pegaso living atop Nydirsil flew away,” he read. “Khe gave chase, forced himself upon the winged mare and sired the first kheirons, twins female and male.
“Il-Kheir, the Horselord, lived on earth as king of all the steed races. But ele-Kheir, the Horsedam, stayed with her mother, with a secret purpose kept safe on the side of the moon never shown to—”
“Kepten, are we moving?” Rafil asked.
Every head looked up and every body stiffened, dialing into the ship. They were bobbing, not moving.
“Odd,” True said, striding out of the quarters and onto the deck. Beneath a sliver of moonlight, the wind was silent. The water barely made a noise.
“The air feels tight,” Rafil said.
Indeed the night had contracted, leaning on the ship, heavy and dense. The bowl of the sky looked odd to Kepten True, as if it was turned inside-out. He searched for the familiar constellations of Nyos and Minos and found them right where they were supposed to be, but it brought no comfort.
“Strange things are afoot, lads,” he said under his breath.
Kheirons falling out of the sky. Pegasos forbidden to help. Kyhrr gifted without a price. Now the wind ran away and the night pressed the ship under its thumb.
Something wants you to be right here, right now.
“I don’t like this business,” he said louder. “Not one bit.”
Rafil stepped closer to him, eyes on the sky. “This is a right cruel development.”
“Zornin said something wanted me in that place at that time,” True said. “But right now, it seems something doesn’t want Tehvan il-Kheir ever to return home.”
“Balls,” Rafil said. “What’s for him won’t pass him by. Not while he’s on your ship.”
By morning, dead calm surrounded the Cay. The sails on all five masts lay limp, marooning the ship in a waveless, windless bubble.
Kepten True sat by Tehvan’s bed, holding the boy’s fivehand in both of his. He thought about the caracaros the Altyns sent to Nyland. He thought about the Cay’s own messenger birds, dispatched toward Alondra, heralding the rescue. The memory of Zornin’s words made him sigh over and over against the anxiety in his throat.
We called upon the pegasos for help. They wouldn’t come.
Not that they refused. They were forbidden to come.
Wouldn’t surprise me if our birds never arrived in Nyland.
“One will get through, lad,” True said, patting Tehvan’s hand. “Your Da will know soon I’ve got you. He’ll be flying out to meet us. I’d like to see anything try to get in his way. He might even be coming right now.”
Right here, right now.
He shivered in his skin, fearing the foalboy might not live to see his father again. True would have to face Sevri il-Kheir and tell him his only son died so close to home.
True freed one hand to dig fingers between his plaits, pulling hard at his scalp. They were so close. They’d flown over the waters from Altynai, the breath of the gods filling every sail. The Teeth barely grazed them. They slipped through the Gullet like a sip of sweet wine. The ocean flung itself out of the way, urging them on. Home. Home. Hurry. Hurry.
But then the wind disappeared, the ocean turned to rippling glass and the Cay sat still, staring at her own reflection.
“Godsdammit it all,” the kepten said.
Tehvan stirred, his head turning from one side to the other and words under his breath.
“What’s that, lad?” True said.
“Alon.”
“Alon?” It was the giantword for lark. The birds who brought souls to the newborn.
“Those are caracaros,” the kheiron whispered. “Alon, do you see them?”
He must mean the boy. That poor wretched child whose bones were picked over by wolves. If he has a mother, her heart would break.
“I’m sorry,” Tehvan said. “It wasn’t me, it was him.”
“Shh.” True put his hand on the foalboy’s burning head. “None
of it was your fault.”
“Tell the story.”
“Hm? You want me to read, lad?” Trueblood reached at random from the stack on the floor and came up with one of his childhood picture books. The spine tattered and the corners of the covers worn round. His thumb fanned the soft pages until he found an old favorite.
“Truvos, god of the sea, built three great ships from the wood of Nye trees,” he read. “The Khollima, the Kaleuche and the Khe.”
He balanced the book in his lap and kept tight hold of Tehvan’s hand. Kept his voice rolling and soft as he read about those magnificent vessels.
The Khollima wasn’t the largest ship, but she was the sole transporter of Nye for centuries. Then came the Nyvosok—the titanic feud between Nyos and Truvos that pulled the Tree of Life from her roots. Truvos sailed away on the Khollima, his slain lover Khe on a bier, towing Nydirsil behind.
“Never to return,” True read, “until a love between giant and kheiron bloomed threefold on earth.
“The Kaleuche was the second giantship. Truvos built it with the help of the mighty twins, Raj and Lejo. They built it bigger and taller and faster. After the Nyvosok, the twins became the leaders of House Tru. They surpassed all other mariners in skill, reputation and wealth. But then they sailed away one day and didn’t return. Neither them, nor the crew, nor the Kaleuche was ever seen again.”
Kepten True leaned toward the bed as if confiding a secret. “My grandfather swore he saw the Kaleuche once, and I’ve heard more than a few salty dogs say the same. Always at dawn, usually shrouded in mist. Funny thing is, two people who see the ship at the same time describe the experience in utterly different ways. What do you make of that, lad?”
Tehvan’s fingers were limp, his breathing slow and deep.
“Good boy,” True said. “Rest now, valentos.” My brave one.
He cleared his throat and read the last part on the page.
“The third ship, the Khe, endured. She was built with the help of Pel, the gentle and wise nephew of Raj and Lejo. Pel brought honor and respect to House Tru. Some even said he was the embodiment of Nye, and this made the Khe endure. The ship passed from mariner to mariner’s son, over generations of giants. And when the giants were no more, the ship sailed on, steered by half-giants. Then quarter-giants. Until the original blood of the race ran thin in the veins of House Tru. Yet it ran deep. And it endured.”
He closed the tome, crossed his arms over it and closed his eyes.
Nobody remembers when the ship’s name morphed from Khe to Cay, he thought. Or when the dynasty’s name morphed from Tru to True. Names come and go, lad. But we endure.
We make our own beauty in the world and we endure.
The Kepten dreamed of his bride. Noë Treeblood, sumptuous and sweet in his bed, winding him up in her arms and legs and her red-gold hair. The future beckoned his heart into the depths of her wide, gray eyes, pointing to a child who would call him Da.
“Your heart must be strong, Ikharus,” Noë said, pulling free from his arms and climbing up a great tree. He followed her, resting often and choosing wisely. Nine branches spread from the massive trunk, each anchored to the sky with a single star.
“Eight branches for the eight gods,” Noë said, pointing up through the canopy. “The ninth and tallest for Os, who is One. Anchored with Estelos, the greatest star. It takes a heart of steel to keep it safe.”
True pulled her to him and she wrapped arms around his neck.
“Come home,” she said. “I want to live in your heart.”
She was liquid on his tongue and he swallowed her kiss, consumed his bride, the truth of his blood. She said his name and it was the most giant of giantwords. She plucked a star off the ninth branch, held it out to him like a silver apple. He went to bite it but instead she put it on his finger like a kheiron’s ring and married him…
He woke and knew something was wrong.
He’s gone. Tehvan’s dead. He died in the night.
His startled lungs softened as Tehvan stirred in the big bed. His closed eyelids were violet and trembling, the lashes damp. A blue vein flickered in his temple.
“She’s here,” he whispered.
Kepten True walked out of the aftercastle. A thick mist surrounded the Cay. His entire crew stood on deck, every pair of eyes transfixed and staring off the starboard side.
True slowly pushed through the shoulders of his men. Looking out, then up.
“My Gods,” he said.
It was bigger than the Cay. Bigger than the sky. The top of its main mast shrouded by the clouds overhead. The hull stretching right and left as far as the eye could see. Every member of the Cay saw it, but no two would describe it the same way.
The air was perfectly still and silent as the Kaleuche pulled alongside her sister.
No one hailed them from its decks.
The Kaleuche bumped the Cay’s hull. Precise. Almost delicate. She bumped their side again, soft as a kiss but deliberate with curious affection. As if to say, Is it you?
Tears sprang to Kepten True’s eyes. All his life, he’d only known the power of the Cay. A thorough and intimate knowledge, but singular. It never occurred to him two giantships had a power and energy of their own. A personality. An affinity.
They’re alive. They know each other. Did the Cay call out for help?
The Kaleuche stopped bumping and the wall of her hull began to move.
“Is she sinking?” Abrakam said. “Or are we rising?”
Nobody tore their eyes away to check. They stood mute and staring as the top decks of the sister ships came to the same level. The ships shuddered still, their sides caressing.
“Rafil,” Kepten True said. “Come with me.”
Boarding the Kaleuche was like stepping into a painting. Everything was preternaturally still. The ship was emptier than a cup. Not a scrap of humanity in the neat cabins or the Kepten’s quarters. Not a book, a bottle, a candle stub, a shoe, a rag, not one object anywhere. The galley had no pots or pans, no dishes or knives. The workrooms echoed. The holds didn’t even contain dust.
“It’s so clean,” Rafil said.
“I don’t understand,” Kepten True said, skin crawling with a strange sensation. Something between arousal and fear. “There’s nothing here.” His voice had conviction but his soul was in doubt.
Rafil’s expression had gone soft. As if he’d fallen asleep behind open eyes. His rough hand slid into the crook of True’s elbow.
“What’s for you won’t pass you by, lad,” he said.
True clasped the boatswain’s fingers, grateful for his presence. Rafil was the last of the crew who sailed with True’s father and he was allowed to call True “lad” in private. If Rafil gave advice, True took it. If Rafil gave his word, True believed it.
If nothing for him were on this ship, it would’ve passed him by.
They walked the decks again. Slower this time, working from the top down.
They found the twins in the nyellem.
Two sleeping baby boys lay on a bed in the spice hold. The small room was wreathed in the scent of spice that ceased being transported in this ship centuries ago, yet its odor clung to the wood in the walls. It crept into True’s nose and under his eyelids and along his tongue.
“Remarkable,” he said. “Just like the story. The mighty twins built the Kaleuche, sailed away and disappeared. But here they are again. Reborn.”
Time joined hands in a beautiful circle as True breathed in the ancient scent of Nye. His heart pressed against the wall of his chest and happiness like a cresting wave broke from the top of his head because oh, wasn’t the world wonderful and these boys, these beautiful boys sleeping and weren’t they remarkable and wonderful and for him, of course for him and they hadn’t passed him by, no, they were here, these boys, they glowed like starlight and if only he could climb the mast of the
world and set them in the sky, set them at the tips of nine branches, they would bring Nye back to the world and wouldn’t it all be wonderf—
The door to the hold slammed shut, plunging Kepten True into darkness.
One of the babies whimpered, then fell silent.
“Rafil?” he called.
“No, Ikharus,” a woman’s voice said. “It’s I.”
He knew her. So strange this knowing—her identity certain in the most trusting parts of his heart. His faithful soul recognized her, yet his human, secular brain, so comforted by what he could give a name, needed more than this.
“Are you real?” he said.
“Of course. The centaur read my story two nights ago. Don’t you remember?”
True reached open-eyed into darkness, as if to slide an imaginary book off a shelf. Pages fanned beneath his thumb, beautifully illustrated. Ancient script he could not read, only recite from memory.
Khe gave chase, forced himself upon the pegaso mare, and sired the first kheirons, twins female and male. Each born with a moonstone that allowed them to shift between horse and man, and the power of flight bound either to silver hooves or nine silver rings.
“Yes,” she said.
The male kheiron was a mortal creature who lived on earth as il-Kheir, king of the horsefolk. His descendants threading through decades and centuries. The heir to that unbroken line lay dying on True’s ship, the needle of time pierced through two fractured legs.
But the female, the kheirone…
The female stayed with her mother as ele-Kheir, with a secret purpose kept safe on the side of the moon never shown to man.
The Horsedam moved in darkness and legend. She was heard but rarely seen. Full of doubt and belief, Kepten True felt her cold gaze press his shoulders, heavy with intention. She had a purpose for him. She must, or the ship would’ve passed him by.
“What is it?” he whispered. “What do you have for me?”
“It’s what you have for me.” Her voice was silvery, cold and mournful. “I’m pleased it’s you. And I’m sorry.”
The Voyages of Trueblood Cay Page 8