Song of the Dead

by Sarah Glenn Marsh

  Darkness crouches all around us, but in here there’s warmth and light, and Meredy’s eyes meeting mine each time she pauses to turn another page, and—a small but steady spark.

  * * *

  * * *

  “We need to have a talk,” Kasmira announces the next morning as the rest of us yawn into our breakfast. Already wide awake, Kasmira has let her first mate, Dvora, take the wheel for a little while, but she’s called the rest of the crew into the dining hall for some sort of meeting.

  “Remind me where we’re headed again?” a sailor asks. “Sorrel?”

  “Sarral,” Kasmira says patiently. It’s a westerly kingdom one of her contacts in Lyris mapped out for us before things got heated. “And that’s partly why I called you all here. See, I was just thinking—from now on, we need to have a cover story. The Lyrians never minded my, ah, trading ventures, but others might consider them . . . criminal. Besides, we don’t want anyone in Sarral asking questions about who’s on the throne back home. That means we’ll need an excuse for why we were allowed to leave when everyone knows King Wylding forbids it. Suggestions?”

  “Why do we need to treat our new queen like some big secret, anyway?” someone asks. I recognize her as a friend of the loudmouthed sailor who let out the news of King Wylding’s demise at the tavern in Lyris.

  “Because we don’t know how or when Valoria plans to contact other leaders,” I say, trying to keep the irritation from my voice. The answer seems so obvious. “We don’t know how they’ll react to her rule, to the new Karthia. We need to keep things under wraps for now, to let Valoria decide how to reach out to the world on her own terms.”

  “What if,” Meredy interjects calmly, “we tell anyone who inquires that King Wylding and his council had a meeting about updating their maps, and while he was opposed, the queen changed his mind?”

  Kasmira shakes her head. “The queen hated change as much as her husband.”

  Grinning at Meredy, I chime in, “I know it’s lame. But no one has spoken to the queen in over two centuries, so do they really have a reason not to take our word for it?”

  Kasmira and a few of her sailors laugh, apparently satisfied.

  But I’m not. Not quite yet. “What’s our real story though, Kas? I mean . . . where do we plan to go from here? From Sarral, rather?” Given the heavy silence that follows, it’s something we’ve all started to wonder.

  “Well, speaking of maps,” Kasmira says after a pause, “I’m sure the Sarralans have some. Assuming I can get them to play nice and share, we’ll have our pick of destinations. I’m not particular on the where myself, as long as there’s gold and jewels and kisses for the taking. So, how much of the world do you all want to see before we head home?”

  I don’t have to think about my answer for long.

  “Nineteen new places,” I say quickly, looking to Meredy for approval. “We can count Lyris and Sarral as two of them, so that leaves seventeen to go before we head back to Karthia. That is, if everyone else agrees.”

  Meredy doesn’t meet my eyes, but she touches the small of my back with a shaking hand, making words impossible for a moment. When I find my voice again, I add for the crew’s benefit, “That’s one place for every year Evander lived, every year he was robbed of seeing the world. How long do you suppose that will take?”

  Kasmira touches her fingers to her brow in a salute—a sign of respect for Evander’s memory. “Perhaps a year, or perhaps much longer. Depends how much you want to linger in any given spot.”

  “Not long,” I say quickly, thinking of how little I liked Lyris, and what unpleasant things could await us on other shores. “Let’s try to make seventeen quick stops after Sarral this year—you can choose the places, whichever ones have the shiniest jewels and the prettiest people to kiss—and then return to Karthia to share all we’ve seen with Valoria.”

  After a moment’s consideration, Kasmira flashes a grin. Just like that, we have a plan.

  * * *

  * * *

  The sea was supposed to carry me far away from my problems. From echoes of death and suffering. From nightmares. From monsters. But with the person who’s becoming my biggest problem of all lying on a cot not two feet from mine, feigning sleep, the heat from our bodies stifling in this tiny room, I wonder if this trip will solve anything like I’d hoped. I wonder if King Wylding really did keep me there, sheltered behind his marble walls, for my own good. If he was right to fear the unknown.

  I don’t think so, somehow. In the fourteen days since Karthia’s shore became a smudge of ash on the horizon, I haven’t seen anything to make me scream, or even shiver—unless the tavern fight in Lyris counts. So far, the unknown is just salty, smelly, and damp. The path to Sarral seems endless.

  Meredy shifts on her cot. Unable to steal a glimpse of her in the velvety darkness, I picture her lying there, restless, her hair unbound and puddling on the floor as she tries to make her lumpy pillow comfortable. It’s hard not to think about her, even dream about her, when she’s this close.

  A wave jars me into greater alertness as it slaps the hull of the Paradise—or My Failed Escape Plan, as I’ve decided to call it—and the ship groans as the wind shudders around it. My body protests the hard tilt to the left with a shiver of nausea. I scramble upright. If the ship takes on water, I’m going down with it.

  “Nightmare? Or seasick?” Meredy asks blearily, lighting our fish-oil lantern that casts deep shadows with its greasy glow. She hangs its ancient strap from a beam overhead. “Shall I fetch the bucket?”

  “Nope. I’m not giving up that easily.” Smiling weakly, I grip the edge of my cot as the ship creaks and rights itself. “But I suppose this is a good time to mention I don’t know how to swim.”

  Meredy looks more alert now. “Me neither . . .”

  I frown. It’s not that I expect Meredy to save me if something goes wrong out here. I just tend to think of her as someone who can do everything. “Your mentor didn’t give you swimming lessons when you were training to survive in the wilds as a beast master?”

  She flashes a faint smile. “The lakes in Lorness aren’t warm enough for that.”

  Funny. In our two weeks on this ship, surrounded by water, neither of us has mentioned swimming. Guess we’ve both had too many other things on our minds.

  Another wave slams into the ship, nearly knocking us from our cots. My sword slides out from under my bed, striking the opposite wall. The bags of coffee beans Meredy bought in Lyris fly off a crooked table. And above us, the strap holding our lantern suddenly snaps, sending the heavy glass straight toward the ground.

  I dive for it, flinging my hands out, and barely avoid colliding with Meredy as she does the same. If we burn up the ship, we’ll have to learn to swim a whole lot sooner.

  The battered wood floor scrapes my bare legs, but the lantern is safe in my shaking hands. Struggling to balance on the tilting floor, I somehow manage to climb to my feet and set the lantern gently on the ground, steadying it between the bags of coffee beans.

  “Good catch.” Meredy settles on her cot, legs crossed, and pats the empty space beside her. I join her, careful to keep some distance between us. The moment I sit, she locks eyes with me. “We’re lucky you have such quick reflexes, Master Necromancer.”

  “Odessa,” I correct under my breath. I’ve been trying to get her to use my name this whole trip, but she’s still talking to me like we’re sisters-in-arms. Not like two people who wake each other up from nightmares we don’t want to talk about, who have nights where we read together and sometimes share memories of Evander.

  Still, no matter what she calls me, I just want to chase the worry from her eyes, but it seems I don’t have the magic or the words for that. All I can do is talk to her, keep her mind occupied. “The sea wasn’t this rough when we went to bed. We must have sailed right into a storm. It’s not like Kasmira, forgetting to check our pa
th.”

  Meredy takes some coffee beans from one of the bags steadying the lantern and offers them to me. “We’re farther west than she or any of the crew has ever been now, she said. I’m sure her Sight showed her this storm, but we’re all eager to reach Sarral.” She shrugs, but the worry doesn’t leave her face. “She must think the crew can push through it.”

  I crunch on a handful of coffee beans, which momentarily distract me from my nerves as waves continue to pummel the ship. “She knows they can, or we wouldn’t be here. Kasmira would never put any of us—least of all herself—in danger. Even if her confidence errs on the side of recklessness.”

  Saying this aloud makes me feel better for all of two seconds.

  The ship leans hard to the left, trying to force Meredy and me from our seats again, and my heart attempts to claw its way out of my chest. Meredy, however, seems more bothered by my scraped knee than the fact that we might be guests at a feast for the fishes soon.

  “You’re bleeding.” She frowns as she studies the scrape.

  I hadn’t noticed until she pointed it out. Apparently the floor rubbed my lower leg raw when I dove for the lantern, and I’ve smeared red all over Meredy’s only blanket. “I’m sorr—”

  “Shhh. You’ve nothing to be sorry for.” She hurries to our water basin, the contents of which are mostly sloshed on the floor, and dampens a clean corner of the worn blanket to dab my wound. The fabric is soothingly cold. “Let me fix this.”

  “All right. But I owe you my blanket, at least.” I start to rise, to grab the clean blanket from my cot, but Meredy begins gingerly tidying my scrape, careful never to let any bit of her skin graze mine as she works with the cool cloth.

  “There,” she says after what feels like an hour of silence. “How does it feel now?”

  “Good as new,” I assure her. “Really, thanks.”

  She leans closer, peering into my eyes as if trying to detect a lie, and a grin spreads across my face. I almost wish I could sink through the floor and join the fish now. This is what scares me—not how I want her body tangled up with mine, because it’s surely only natural to want to kiss a girl this smart, this beautiful—but how my heart behaves around her. Sometimes, like when she’s trying out a funny new voice as we read, or I catch her and Lysander stealing glances at me from around a corner while I’m practicing with my sword, I think I want to be with her. But how can I be sure, when just weeks ago, I was willing to leave her for good?

  This is what I tried to leave behind when I decided to board the Paradise without Meredy. This longing can never be anything more, not with Evander forever caught in the middle. Yet we’re too often stuck in this cabin, where there’s no escaping the current of feelings Meredy stirs in me.

  “That’s it. We need a distraction!” she declares, misreading my expression as fear of the storm, or perhaps boredom. “At least until we’re tired enough to sleep through the rest of this mess.”

  She grabs The Baroness’s Secret Heartache, flipping open to chapter twenty-six, and settles herself on the opposite end of her cot, leaving an Evander-sized space between us. I feign an interested smile, though the story has gotten less interesting with each page.

  I miss the first few chapters, not because of any particular moment or character, but because I like beginnings. The endless possibilities that exist within them.

  “Would you start over?” I ask. “I want to hear about when Alva meets Lunette again. They could’ve been great together. I mean, they were great, until chapter nine, when what’s-his-name showed up . . .”

  Meredy nods like she understands. “Of course you want to go back to the beginning. Before things get messy.”

  As I lean against the wall, ready to listen, another book catches my eye. Her father’s journal. It must’ve been pushed from its spot under the bed when Meredy picked up the book we’re reading.

  “How’s that coming?” I ask, nodding to the journal. She hasn’t mentioned whether she’s having any luck picking up the threads of her father’s dreams to see and study the world.

  “Oh, not bad.” Meredy lifts the leather journal and flips to a spot about halfway through. “So far, I’ve filled in the names of some of the smaller islands around Lyris and such.” She taps a speck southwest of Karthia, surrounded by other even smaller flecks of ink.

  The mere mention of Lyris leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. From now on, whenever we finally go ashore again—which must be soon, given how our bread supply is dwindling—my master necromancer’s pin will stay stashed with the coffee beans and blown-glass trinkets.

  I can’t really call myself a master now, anyway. I left my job behind when I left Karthia, and now I’m becoming what I once feared I would when Evander asked me to come away with him: just some girl on a ship. Strangely, with Meredy on my mind, the realization doesn’t bother me quite as much as I expected. At least not right now.

  “I’m taking notes on people and places, too,” Meredy adds, regaining my attention. “A recipe for the fish stew they like in Lyris, and how they think the Five-Faced God is actually five gods and goddesses. I can’t believe I just assumed everyone worshipped Vaia, even outside Karthia.”

  I think about that a moment as I run my fingers over Meredy’s careful notes. “I like that there are different ways of explaining our magic,” I say at last. “The world is full of more ideas and ways of doing things than I think anyone in Karthia could’ve imagined.”

  “That’s what Father fell in love with.” Meredy smiles. “All the potential in discovering a new place.” She leans a little closer, her eyes inviting me to share in some secret. “I didn’t tell Kasmira this, because I might be wrong, but . . . I think Father sailed even farther west than we are now, once. Of course, I could be getting my directions mixed up . . . and Father could’ve been drinking, or distracted, or completely mistaken in some other way . . .”

  She’s so hesitant that I smile, urging her to go on.

  “He wrote about a vast land and a beast we don’t have in Karthia, something like a lizard but the size of a dog, with talons. And it could breathe frost, or fire—I’m not really sure what this word is, it’s too smudged . . .” Meredy trails off, biting her lower lip as if to keep from laughing at herself.

  I grin back. “After everything that’s happened lately, a new kind of beast sounds completely possible. Normal, even. For all we know, a giant lizard will crawl out of the sea tomorrow and eat us for breakfast.”

  A sharp crack sounds from overhead, harsh enough to make me wince.

  The keening of the wind grows louder as it whips around the ship, seemingly from all directions. Still, it’s not quite strong enough to mask the sound of someone shouting, or the current of alarm in their voice. I just wish I could make out their words.

  The ship leans so violently to the right that it throws Meredy and me into the wall. Without thinking, I put my arm around her back to shield her. She clings to me, jumping into my lap as we’re tossed about. A song courses through my blood as I hold her, pressing my face into her long, soft hair and breathing deeply.

  The world is cruel, and it’s sharpened my edges. But somehow, after everything I’ve witnessed and every hard thing I’ve done, it’s still so easy to be gentle with her.

  My hands shake as I run my fingers through her hair and pull her in for a kiss, but before our lips touch, shutters snap closed behind her eyes.

  She turns away, sliding off my lap and out of my arms. “Ooh, it’s cold in here,” she declares with a small shiver, “but it’ll be worse on the deck, and we need to check on Kasmira right away.” She pulls on her boots and begins searching for her cloak. It’s not on the peg where she usually leaves it.

  “Here, take mine.” My voice sounds like a stranger’s, full of false warmth as I hand her my cloak. “I don’t mind the cold so much.” I try to search her gaze as I hold out the cloak. If she’d just tell me
what she’s thinking, maybe I wouldn’t say or do the wrong things.

  Meredy gently pushes my offering away. “I’ll be fine without it, thanks.” When I shoot her a questioning look, her cheeks redden. “It smells like you, Odessa, and I can never focus when I’m thinking of you!”

  Well, she finally used my name.

  Silence steals over the cabin, the ship’s new, horrible noises filling the space between us.

  At last, Meredy murmurs darkly, “You always do this. Rattle me. Push me too far. Make me say things I regret.” Her hands clench at her sides. “Are you satisfied?”

  For the first time since the waves jarred me awake, a bout of stomach-rolling seasickness creeps over me. “I’m not, actually. I’m not satisfied at all. I don’t understand—what is it you want?”

  Meredy presses her fingers to her lips and shakes her head. “We don’t have time for this,” she says in a small voice. To my dismay, she’s put a familiar shield over her face. It’s the one she used to wear around me, the one that makes it impossible to get a hint of her thoughts.

  “You’re right. Things sound bad out there. That crash—”

  I pause, my heart beating double as more raised voices punch the air. “Moving a storm is a serious job, even for a skilled weather worker like Kasmira, and I’m sure that’s what she’s trying to do.” I cross the few steps to the door, swaying as the ship tips left again. “I think you should try to find a healer—look for Dvora,” I add, naming the first hazel-eyed person on board who comes to mind.

  Still Meredy won’t meet my gaze, though she nods stiffly in agreement with my plan.

  For some reason, I want to put my fist through the ship’s hull. Well, maybe not that. But I’d dearly like to hit something that can’t spring a leak.

  “Look, I get it.” I throw open the door, having pulled on my cloak and boots to cover my nightdress. “You don’t like me like that, but at some point, you’re going to have to speak to me again. I’m sorry, Master Crowther.”