Whispering Twilight

by Melissa McShane

  Speaking to other Speakers was a simple matter, though nothing she had ever been able to explain to those who did not share her talent. She could not even explain how she distinguished between the members of her reticulum. She simply knew them on a level that went beyond the details of their physical forms or voices, and Speaking to them, forming that glowing connection, was as easy as breathing.

  Speaking to a non-Speaker was considerably more difficult. She had to picture the person she intended to Speak to, and maintain her focus on the message she delivered. It was all to do with lacking the connection two Speakers had when they Spoke, she believed, that made Speaking so enjoyable and compelling.

  Bess recalled…who was it she had explained this to? Yes. The mysterious Mr. Quinn. For a moment, she was distracted by memory from her attempt to Speak to Mr. Thorpe. She had not Spoken to Mr. Quinn since that evening at the Hainsworths’, and she idly wondered what he would do if she addressed him now. Of course she would not, because she had decided not to invade his privacy, but he intrigued her. She had never considered that anyone might conceal his talent, and found it difficult to imagine there were many people in the world who did, not when there were so many advantages to having talent. But Mr. Quinn had been vehement about his dislike for Speaking, his certainty that he would be forced to endure an unpleasant reticulum, and it made Bess wonder if there might not be some validity to his position. If so, her heart went out to him.

  Bess closed her eyes again and brought Mr. Thorpe’s image to mind, his grey hair, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes and the lines that dragged down his mouth. He slightly resembled a beagle, though of course she would never tell him that; she respected him too much to mock him, even indirectly.

  Mr. Thorpe, she Spoke. Mr. Thorpe, I beg your pardon and hope you are not occupied. Captain Vallance asks that I address you. The Mary Peirce has encountered a severe storm and we have been driven off course. This will delay our arrival in Panama City, but I do not know by how long. I will communicate this information to your representative there immediately, and will address you again in a few hours, when we have more information. Mr. Rawleigh assures me there is no serious danger, but I am sure you will wish to stay informed about our situation. Thank you.

  She had no way of hearing a response from Mr. Thorpe, no way of knowing whether he had received her message, but she felt confident he now knew of their predicament. Swiftly she Spoke another, similar message to Mr. Parrish, Mr. Thorpe’s factor in Panama City, and then lay still, gripping the edges of her bed in her fear that she might be tossed out. The movement of the ship had grown more erratic as she delivered her messages, rocking her bed more violently than before. Despite Mr. Rawleigh’s words, her heart beat faster, and she felt caught between a desire to stay where she was and a need to seek out Mr. Ames and flee the ship. But no, Mr. Rawleigh would not deceive her. She forced herself to remain calm.

  To distract herself, she once more thought of Mr. Quinn. It was true, she had resolved not to interfere in his self-imposed solitude, but she could not help her curiosity. The fact that there were only three men in attendance that night at the Hainsworths’ who could possibly be her mysterious stranger increased her desire to ferret out this mystery. Mr. Pakenham. Lord Ravenscroft. And Mr. Addison.

  Of the three, Bess suspected the socially awkward Mr. Addison, given the irritable nature of “Mr. Quinn” and his general surliness, but Mr. Addison had known her for most of her life and surely would not have reacted as if her identity was unknown to him. Mr. Pakenham, as well, knew she was an Extraordinary Speaker and would likely not have been as startled as Mr. Quinn was. And Lord Ravenscroft was so light-minded and cheerful she found it difficult to imagine him as crotchety as her mystery man.

  She felt a quivering sensation in her temples an instant before a Voice Spoke to her: Bess! You will simply not believe what has happened!

  Bess smiled. Rose Fanshawe was eighteen years old and dramatic, but she was also kind and sweet-tempered and Bess liked her tremendously. You must tell me, Rose.

  Lord Saxby is to be in attendance at Lady Simpson’s ball this evening! Is that not the most delicious news?

  Though one’s physical voice had nothing to do with one’s Spoken Voice, Bess had no trouble imagining the excitement in her young friend’s countenance. I take it you anticipate dancing with him?

  Of course I do! He paid me the most particular attention last week when Mama and I met him at the theatre. I declare I am in love!

  Then I wish you good fortune in your partner tonight. Bess stretched, then grabbed the sides of her bed as a particularly severe jolt shot through it. I wish I could be there.

  I wish that too, as you are not interested in Lord Saxby and I need not fear you as a rival. Rose’s amusement rang out clearly across the connection. Are you well?

  Well enough. There is a terrible storm raging.

  The connection trembled with what in a real voice would have been a small shriek. Oh, Bess, are you in danger? Why do you not Bound to safety?

  Because it is merely a storm, dearest, and nothing to fear. Another dive rocked the bed, sending a stab of fear through Bess, and she wondered if she had just lied to her friend. If it does become dangerous, we will certainly Bound away.

  I hope so! I simply do not understand why you chose to take such an awful journey.

  That was not a question Bess could answer for someone as carefree as Rose. It is not awful, and I have seen many wonderful places.

  That is as well, for if you must take ship it should be for exotic locations. Bess, I must go to dinner now, but I will tell you all about the dance tomorrow.

  Good night, then, Rose.

  Faint hollow emptiness, the usual sensation when a Speaker connection dissolved, filled Bess’s chest for the space of two breaths before vanishing. Bess let out another calming breath as the ship rose and dove violently once more. Despite her reassurances to Rose, she grew less sanguine by the moment. If something did happen to the Mary Peirce… You would be Bounded to safety, she reminded herself. This was unpleasant, and frightening, but not truly dangerous. Bounded to safety, and returned to the ship when the storm had passed.

  Mercy stirred and let out a faint moan. Bess crawled out of the bed, clinging to its sides for balance, and slowly made her way to her friend’s side. Mercy’s eyes were still closed, but her lips moved in silent speech. “What is it?” Bess said. She laid a hand on Mercy’s forehead and found, to her dismay, that it was hot and dry. She took Mercy’s hand and discovered it was in the same condition. “You are ill,” Bess said, “and not with sea-sickness. Mercy, can you hear me?”

  Mercy licked her lips. “I feel so cold,” she murmured. “So very cold, Bess.”

  “It is a fever, nothing more,” Bess reassured her. She removed the blanket from her own bed and tucked it around Mercy, despite her fear that she was simply making things worse. She did not understand why Mercy should feel cold when she was burning hot to the touch.

  Mercy shivered violently, then lay still again. “Everything moves so,” she whispered. “And I ache all over. I feel the ship is breaking apart, Bess, are we to drown?”

  Bess crouched beside her, clinging to the bed’s frame for balance, so she could clearly see her friend’s face. “Mr. Rawleigh assures me we will not drown. Remember, Mr. Ames is here? Lie still, and I will bring you water.”

  She staggered out of their small cabin and across the heaving deck to the galley, which was empty, the ship’s stove cold. The little room was dark, so she made her way by feel to the water barrel, which sloshed heavily with each roll of the ship. The movement felt much like she imagined being inside a barrel might feel, bumped and rolled across a cobblestone street. She braced herself against the cold iron of the stove and wondered why they had permitted it to go out. Danger of fire, perhaps? It was not at all difficult to picture the door popping open and scattering hot coals across the deck.

  Her searching fingers ran across the shelves, their cont
ents securely fastened against just such a storm as this, and worked free a wooden mug that slipped from her fingers. Groping around until her hand fell on it, she picked it up and with the other hand groped again for the water barrel. The ship heaved, and she fell against the barrel, feeling water slap her stomach, drenching the top of her skirts instantly. Gritting her teeth, she filled the mug and staggered back to the dim light of the passage, water slopping over the mug’s sides and wetting her hands.

  Mercy looked asleep when Bess returned, but she stirred when Bess passed through the canvas covering the doorway. Bess helped her sit and held the mug to her lips. Water dribbled down Mercy’s chin, but she managed a swallow or two before lying back in exhaustion. Bess drank the rest of the water herself, reasoning that it might be knocked over by the ship’s movements, then set the empty mug on the little shelf built into the hull and regarded Mercy. Her breathing sounded rough and was loud enough Bess could hear it despite the thrumming of rain and waves against the hull. She knew little of nursing, but it was obvious Mercy was in distress.

  She made a decision and left the cabin, touching each canvas door flap as she passed, though she could see well enough to find the companionway. At the bottom of the steps, she hesitated. Cold lashings of salt water mixed with rain soaked the companionway and sprayed Bess’s face. Going above would be hazardous. She gripped the highest step she could reach to steady herself and sent out a thought: Mr. Rawleigh, I have need of you. I am at the bottom of the companionway. If you can, please join me.

  She waited. The wind howled across the hole in the deck like a damned soul, rising and falling in pitch. More water splashed through it, catching Bess in the face. She removed her spectacles and attempted to dry them on her skirt, remembered it was wet from the water barrel, and settled for wiping the worst of the spray from the lenses.

  A dark shape loomed above, cutting off what little light entered the lower deck. “Miss Hanley, you should stay below!” Mr. Rawleigh shouted over the roar of the wind. He was drenched, his dark blond hair turned brown with sea water and plastered to his forehead.

  “Miss Caines is very ill,” Bess replied, then had to repeat herself when the wind swallowed her words. “I think Mr. Ames should Bound her where she might receive care.”

  Mr. Rawleigh said nothing for a moment. Then he shouted, “Perhaps Mr. Ames should remove both of you from the ship.”

  “Is it so bad?”

  “I do not wish to frighten you, but…” Mr. Rawleigh’s words trailed off. “It is a precaution, nothing more. I will send Mr. Ames to you.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Rawleigh.”

  Bess retreated to her cabin. Despite Mr. Rawleigh’s reassurances, her heart was pounding with fear, not only for herself and Mercy, but for Mr. Rawleigh and the other sailors who would remain behind. Surely the Mary Peirce would not sink? And if it did, Mr. Ames would rescue the others before they could drown.

  She helped Mercy rise, then supported her as she stood on trembling legs and shivered uncontrollably. “Where are we going?” Mercy whispered.

  “Back to England. You need rest, and you cannot get that on a ship in a storm,” Bess said.

  “I feel so ill. You should not have to wait on me.”

  “Do not be so foolish. You would care for me if our situations were reversed.”

  A hand pushed the canvas aside. “Miss Hanley, Miss Caines, please come with me,” Mr. Ames said. He was younger than either of them, tall and loose-limbed, and at the moment his expression was grim. Bess put her shoulder beneath her friend’s arm, and with halting steps they joined Mr. Ames at the door. The Bounder arranged Mercy’s arm around his neck, taking her weight from Bess, and said, “Do you know where the Bounding chamber is, Miss Hanley?”

  “I have never seen it,” Bess said.

  Mr. Ames nodded and, supporting Mercy, led Bess across the lower deck to the bow of the ship, where the hull curved inward to a narrow, claustrophobic space. Here, between the heads, a flimsy wooden door closed off Mary Peirce’s Bounding chamber. Though Bess had never been inside, she assumed it looked much the same as every other Bounding chamber: whitewashed or painted walls, with an abstract symbol in varying colors and shapes painted somewhere within. Mr. Thorpe had told her trading ships used canvases in portable frames rather than painting the symbols directly on the walls, which struck her as practical for a fleet of ships whose Bounders’ assignments might be flexible.

  “Wait for me here, Miss Hanley, and I will return shortly,” Mr. Ames said. He lifted Mercy in his thin arms and vanished with a pop barely audible over the creaking of the hull.

  Bess waited. A Bounder could Bound from anywhere he liked, but he needed a Bounding chamber’s symbol as a focus for his talent, and could not simply Bound to any location in the world. Soon Mr. Ames would step out of the Bounding chamber and take her to join Mercy.

  But he did not return. Bess waited in growing impatience, pressed against the curve of the hull, as the minutes slipped by. Gradually, impatience turned to apprehension. There was no reason Mr. Ames should not have returned immediately. Finally, unable to bear the suspense, Bess wrenched open the Bounding chamber door.

  The room beyond was even smaller than Bess had imagined, barely large enough to hold two people. It smelled not only of seawater and tar, but of scorched canvas. The source of the smell was a two-foot square of canvas attached to a wooden frame that leaned against one of the bulkheads. As the ship rose and dove yet again, the frame swung free as if it were a door on oiled hinges, then settled back into place. The smell of burned canvas grew stronger.

  Bess entered the room and took hold of the frame, lifting it away from the bulkhead to reveal a small iron lantern behind which burned a tiny flame not large enough to prevent a Bounder from using the chamber. She pushed on the frame, making it swing away from the bulkhead until it lay flat against the hull perpendicular to the Bounding chamber’s wall. With her fingers, she explored the place where the hull and the frame met and found rough, cracked wood where the frame had once been set into a carved socket in the hull.

  Bess continued to hold the frame in place as she balanced against the ship’s movement and examined the Bounding symbol painted on the canvas, three curved stripes of paint, one blue, two red, intersecting with each other to make a lopsided triangle. A smear of brown covered the intersection of the red stripes, an irregular blotch at odds with the crispness of the stripes.

  Unease prompted Bess to touch the brown paint. The canvas felt dry under her fingers, dry and dusty, and when she removed her hand, char stuck to her fingertips. She sniffed her hand and sneezed at the stink of burned canvas. Not paint. A burn.

  The ship lurched again, and Bess fell against the frame, crying out at how its edge caught her painfully where her neck met her shoulder. She let the frame go and watched it swing once again into the bulkhead and the hot glass of the lantern. Bess shrieked and snatched the frame away, knowing it was too late. The scorch mark had defaced the Bounding symbol.

  Mr. Rawleigh! she exclaimed. Mr. Rawleigh, the Bounding chamber is unusable!

  She scrubbed at the scorch mark. Possibly it was not a deep burn, and she might wipe the char away. A Bounding symbol had to be perfect for a Bounder to use it as a focus, and keeping a Bounder out of a particular location was as simple as altering or ruining the symbol. If Mr. Ames had not returned, it was because he could not. She rubbed harder and succeeded only in enlarging the brown smear.

  Mr. Ames, she Spoke to the absent Bounder, the Bounding symbol is damaged. I am attempting to repair it.

  But despair crept over her as she scrubbed to no avail. Please try to Bound now, she told Mr. Ames, letting go of the canvas frame. It immediately swung back to lie against the lantern. Bess wrenched it back into its original position, realized she had no way to wedge it into place, and leaned against the hull, feeling as weary as if she had run a mile. Even had she repaired the symbol, Mr. Ames could not return while she was within the Bounding chamber, and she could no
t fix the frame in place. She, and all the sailors on the Mary Peirce, were trapped aboard a ship that was very likely doomed.

  Chapter 4

  In which Bess’s journey takes an unexpected turn

  The ship groaned around her, the sound of a creature in extreme pain. Something cracked and splintered in the distance. Bess staggered to the doorway, holding to its side as the ship bucked and tilted once more. There was a definite list to one side, tilting the deck enough that Bess could feel it, and water sloshed around her feet. Keeping one hand on the rough, damp sides of the passage for balance, she made her careful way toward the companionway, her heart pounding painfully in her chest.

  Ahead, someone came heavily down the steps and ran toward her. “Miss Hanley,” Mr. Rawleigh said, “what do you mean, the Bounding chamber is unusable?”

  Bess glanced over her shoulder at the end of the passage, too distant for her to see the Bounding chamber’s open door. “The Bounding symbol has been defaced. Burned. Mr. Ames cannot return.”

  Mr. Rawleigh’s lips compressed in a tight frown. He brushed past her, not apologizing for how his abrupt movement made her wobble, and ran toward the Bounding chamber. Bess tried not to be annoyed that he had not taken her word for it; she could hardly blame him for wanting to be certain. And perhaps he would know of a way to restore the symbol. The optimistic thought did nothing to dispel her fear.

  Mr. Rawleigh thundered back toward Bess. “Miss Hanley, you must come now.” He took her arm roughly and hurried her to the companionway.

  “Mr. Ames cannot return,” Bess repeated.

  “I know. It is a disaster. I regret that you have been caught up in it with the rest of us. I apologize. I should have sent you away the moment we knew the storm would be bad.”