The Tempest Sea

by Robin D. Mahle

  I couldn’t get a read on how she felt about consenting to this. I reached into my side pocket, and her eyebrows climbed. I had been planning to apologize, to try to convince her to take it. I didn’t realize she had already changed her mind. I held out the dagger. She took it tentatively in her palm, turning it one way and then the other, face impassive.

  “It is beautiful. Shall I presume there’s a way to carry it that does not involve cavernous pockets in one’s pants?”

  She turned away from the deck light, so I couldn’t see her expression. I pulled out the leather-belted sheath. She took it from me awkwardly.

  “What is it?” She was mincing her words more than usual tonight. I wondered if it hurt to talk with her new raspy voice.

  “A leg sheath.”

  “How does it work?” she asked as she held it up between us.

  Is she seriously asking me to secure this belt to her thigh?

  She waited expectantly, eyebrows arched.

  All right, then. I swallowed.

  I knelt down in front of her. She was right-hand dominant, so I placed my hands on her right thigh and gently eased it away from her left leg. My heartbeat thundered in my ears, and I struggled to keep my breathing even. I held my hand out for the holster, and she placed it in my hand. I circled it around her leg, my fingers grazing the top of her thigh. Thankfully, I didn’t have to focus much. My practiced hands pulled leather threads through loops and buckled the sheath without thinking.

  When I was finished, I got to my feet. We were closer than I realized. Addie’s wide eyes stared up at me. She held the dagger out to me, hilt first. Instead of taking it, I put my hand around hers, directing it to the holster now secured at her leg. She looked down at it for a moment.

  When she looked back up, her face was inches from mine, expression guarded. Neither of us spoke for a moment.

  “You should get to bed,” Addie finally said, stepping back.

  “And what about you?” I asked.

  “Not in the cards for me tonight.” She turned to sit at the railing as she always did, feet dangling overboard, arms on the wooden planks. Her hand slid unconsciously to run along the hilt of the dagger.

  I sat next to her, the familiarity in the motion not unpleasant.

  “Yeah, I’m not tired, either,” I lied.

  She didn’t turn, but I could swear I saw a tiny smile lift her lips.

  Waking up in a panic was nothing new for me, but this time, the danger felt real.

  I had let the waves lull me to sleep against the railing, not wanting to leave Addie to face her demons alone. I kept having to remind myself she wasn’t mine to protect.

  The next thing I knew, Locke was yelling a warning, ringing the bell of the ship. It was still dark out, but the full moon shining down allowed for visibility.

  I spun around and saw a ship easily four times the size of ours. Any relief that it wasn’t the same boat we had retrieved Addie from was quickly eclipsed by wariness when I caught sight of the curved blades of our attackers.

  Are those pirates?

  I jumped up to stand in front of Addie. They had a plank going from their ship down to ours, and Locke was already engaged in battle with three of them. Two more headed for us, and I drew the sword at my hip. I fended off their attacks, blocking a blow to my right, then spinning to kick the other. Their fighting style was unusual, and they were slimmer than the usual brutes I faced off against.

  The one on the right turned back toward me, and I saw a long braid whip around.

  Are these women? I was trying to stay in front of Addie and fight at the same time. Finally, I managed to knock the closer one back again.

  Three sets of footsteps clambered up the stairs. My brothers and Nell emerged onto the deck, Gunther switching the deck lamp on, and stopped short at the sight before them. They weren’t stalled for long. Both men lunged into action, standing next to me in defense of Addie.

  Locke had a group of downed pirates near him, but more were coming over the gangplank. With my brother on these two, I looked for the leader, quickly finding a woman standing on the deck, ordering someone named “MeLina” to disable the ship.

  “Aye, Captain,” said a woman. She went toward the rudder, and I ran to intercept her.

  The captain appeared before me.

  How did she move that fast?

  I lunged at her, thrusting my blade toward her face. Inches before the impact, she dissolved into an aura of blue lights, one I had seen before.

  Merde!

  The feeling of cold steel against my throat was becoming more familiar than I would have liked. She had reappeared behind me.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw MeLina lean over the deck with a tiny, circular device I could only assume she was placing on the rudder. She pressed a button and there was a clicking sound before the splash of rudder coming apart from the boat and sinking into the sea. The unusual technology was all the proof I needed to confirm my theory. They were Levelian. But what were they doing down here?

  “Drop your weapons, or he dies,” her voice carried.

  There was a freeze around the deck, but no one put their swords away yet. They could see what she couldn’t.

  “I could say the same.” My dagger dug into her side.

  “Impressive,” she said. “It would appear we are at a standoff. There’s no need for anyone to get hurt.”

  “Then why are you here?” Locke asked, his tone murderous.

  “We tracked a signal to your ship. A crystal. You are harnessing a power that is not yours, and I would like to know where you obtained such a thing.” She paused, then added as an afterthought, “Additionally, we find ourselves short on supplies. As long as you don’t make trouble, we’ll take what we need and be on our way. We’ll even leave you with a means of signaling for help.”

  “We’re as good as dead if you do that,” I told her. With our luck, the Court would get that signal.

  “Not as dead as you’ll be if your comrades don’t drop their weapons.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, but Nell’s voice cut me off.

  “You will all drop your weapons, now. I won't have my families killing each other off.” The silver streak of her hair gleamed in the lamplight she had stepped underneath.

  There were gasps around the boat. All at once, every woman but the Captain stopped their fighting and dropped to a knee, right arms crossed over their chests. The blade at my throat vanished as quickly as it had come.

  “PeNelope?” The Captain’s voice was barely more than a whisper. ”You’re alive?”

  “Not for lack of Uncle trying,” Nell responded, face unreadable.

  I turned to look at SuEllen. Her ebony strands were braided back from her face, and her deep forest eyes burned with emotion.

  “You and me both, child.” The captain’s face broke into a smile, and Nell ran into her arms. The pirates looked at each other in bewilderment.

  “We can’t wait here with a signal,” Locke said, echoing my thoughts from earlier. “There are people after us.”

  “Is this true?” the captain asked Nell.

  “Afraid so.”

  “Then come with us. They will not find you, and we will protect you.”

  “Maybe along the way you can tell me how you became a common thief,” Nell suggested.

  “Please, darling. I’m anything but common.” She tossed her braid back.

  “All this banter is great,” I cut in. “But is anyone else leery of boarding the ship of a crew that was trying to rob us five minutes ago?” I added in a few hand signals to Gunther, since I wasn’t sure he was following this entire convoluted exchange.

  Xav raised his hand, and I almost smiled before I remembered I was still angry with him. Addie was uncharacteristically silent. She was backed against the railing, amber eyes even wider than usual, but she offered no comment.

  It was Gunther who spoke up.

  “I don’t see that we have any other options, Clark.”

&nb
sp; “Unfortunately,” Locke bit out. “I concur. We have little choice unless we want to risk being found by the Court.”

  They were both right, but it didn’t make me feel any better. I stared hard at SuEllen, a woman who had done little to endear me to her.

  “No harm will come to anyone on this boat.” It wasn’t a question.

  Her eyes flashed, but she did eventually nod. “I give you my word.”

  Nothing like having only the word of a pirate to guarantee your safety. I took a deep, irritated breath.

  “All right. Let’s get going.”

  If the ladies had needed supplies, they picked the right boat. It took the entire crew several trips to strip the boat of its cargo. Besides the fact that they had invaded our ship, the pirates didn’t seem especially vicious. I pushed aside my earlier reservations about boarding their ship.

  Besides, it could have its perks. My fingers closed around the cylinder in my pocket. I hardly dared to hope I might get my answers at last.

  Addie stayed on The Seaductress until the last possible moment, Shensi in her lap. She was ostensibly soothing the cat, but I had a feeling it was more for her own benefit. She had been eyeing the other ship and the crew warily. Eventually, though, there was no excuse to stay behind.

  She started to cross the narrow gangplank after I had already stepped on. She had her rucksack on her back and Shensi in her arms, looking a little wobbly.

  “Here, let me carry something,” I offered before she pitched overboard.

  She deliberated a moment before thrusting the cat into my arms.

  Perfect. I meant the bag… Then again, this could be perfect. Maybe Shensi would accidentally fall into the water.

  The thought was fleeting. Addie would likely just guilt-trip me into jumping into the sea to rescue the damned thing. My only real consolation was that Shensi didn’t appear to be any happier about the arrangement than I was. She hissed and bit me more than once, but at least she wasn’t trying to escape my grasp. She was likely too fat to dredge up the energy.

  It was a short walk across. I unceremoniously dumped Shensi onto the floor when we landed, and she twitched her tail before moving off to the side.

  Addie was behind me. Noticing she was still wavering a bit, I held out a hand to help her down to the ship. She didn’t let go right away when she was safely on the ground.

  She’s not yours, I reminded myself. I dropped her hand, ignoring the way mine felt suddenly empty. Surely, I imagined the tiny flicker of hurt I saw cross her features.

  “We don’t usually allow men,” the captain spat the last word. She had introduced herself to Addie as SuEllen and pointedly ignored the rest of us. “But I suppose we can make an exception for you.”

  “I suppose you can,” Nell replied imperiously, but there was humor in her tone.

  “I’ll move the crew around, get some cabins freed up for sleep. We can talk tomorrow.” She barked some orders and the women scattered about. “But first, my crystal never would have resonated with the smaller ones in your bracelet. Is that what I think it is around your friend’s neck?”

  I was so used to seeing the amulet on Addie, I had forgotten all about the item that had put us all in this situation to begin with.

  “It is,” Nell answered without hesitation.

  “That could change everything for us.”

  “We can’t remove it.”

  SuEllen laughed. “You’re serious? Let me see what I can find out. The damned thing hasn’t been seen in so long, and we’ve more warriors than scholars on board, but you never know. Someone might know something.”

  Nell nodded thoughtfully.

  “You mean we might be able to remove it?” Addie asked hopefully.

  “We will certainly try.” The Captain turned to the rest of us. “Now then, you’ll have to double up for the night.”

  “I’m not bunking with Locke,” I spoke up first. “He snores.”

  Addie giggled, and the sound brought a smile to my face.

  “I’ll bunk with Locke,” Gunther offered.

  That left me bunking with Xav and wishing I had kept my mouth shut. Xavier and I looked at each other. We hadn’t really talked since he and Addie came back on the boat. I didn’t know what to say to him. He was my brother, and he had been put in an impossible position. But he had lied and almost gotten someone killed. I didn’t know if I was ready to forgive him for that.

  I looked away, and he went to stand at the railing without another word.

  Nell shot a calculated look at Addie, then at me, before turning back to the captain. “I’ll stay with you, Auntie, so we can catch up. If that’s amenable to you.”

  “I’d be delighted,” SuEllen responded.

  Nell winked at Addie and chuckled before turning to follow the captain. Addie glared after the taller girl, cheeks pink. Locke cleared his throat and narrowed his eyes, and Gunther appeared to have missed the entire exchange, caught up in studying the glowing blue lanterns around the deck.

  If Addie was engaged, her best friend didn’t seem concerned about it. That could mean nothing, though. Nell was a free spirit. Addie sat down on a built-in wooden bench. I wanted to walk and familiarize myself with our surroundings as Locke was doing, but I didn’t want to leave her alone. I still wasn’t sure what to think of our apparent new allies, though they didn’t view her with the open hostility they did the men in our party.

  Gunther sat next to her, making the decision for me, and I took off. The ship, unfortunately, was not one of the flying ones. As far as ships went, it was fairly ordinary in and of itself. It was the little pockets of what I assumed were Levelian technology that made it special.

  The lanterns weren’t wired into anything. They were just glass orbs filled with a glowing substance. The locks on the doors on the main deck were flat bronze ovals with no place to insert a key. I only figured out they were locks when one of the women placed her palm over it and the door swung open. She entered only after glaring at me, of course. Gunther was going to have a field day on this ship, if the lady pirates let us live that long. SuEllen may have promised to protect Nell, but I got the feeling they would just as soon hand us over to the Court and be done with all the testosterone invading their ship.

  Did all Levelians hate men? Or just these women? I had plenty of questions floating around in my head. What were they even doing out here when Levelia has been isolated so long most people believe it to be a myth?

  By the time I circled back to the others, SuEllen had returned to show us to our cabins. She led us to a spacious stairway. The blue orbs got dimmer as we descended. Addie’s shoulders tensed more with each step, and her breathing was coming in short bursts. Her hands clenched around Shensi’s blubbery form, who she must have picked back up before we headed down.

  Just how haunted is she by whatever happened to her? How long does it take for someone to recover from weeks in a cell? Then I thought of the mysterious “incident” my brother had mentioned. What happened on that ship to make him second-guess his decision enough to contact Gunther and me?

  I knew from experience she needed to talk to someone, but getting Addie to open up was about as easy as getting Locke to crack a joke. It had taken exhaustion, a dark cabin, and someone dying just for her to admit she’d had a bad day.

  SuEllen pointed out three cabins, two side-by-side and one across from them.

  “Now, I know this situation is unconventional,” the captain began, “but there are still rules on my ship.”

  I bristled at that. Really? She wanted to disable our ship and then give us rules on hers. Locke shook his head at me. I narrowed my eyes but kept my silence. Gunther looked back and forth between the captain and me, watching for any clarifying signs I would give him.

  “The first is, if you want to eat, you have to work.”

  That was fair. This was true of every ship I’d ever been on. We all nodded, even Addie, though she had a dubious look on her face. I almost laughed. She knew her way around a
ship, but I doubted seriously she had ever actually been put to work. At least she seemed to be distracted from her fears for the moment.

  “Second, men. If I catch you harassing my girls, I’ll drop your asses at the nearest island. If you touch one of them, I won't bother to wait for an island. Understand?”

  Another nod all around. SuEllen looked at Xavier for an extra moment, eyes narrowed. He met her gaze evenly, and she moved on.

  “Oh, and rations are strict. Though I may have to make an exception for you.” She eyed Addie’s bony form. “Nell has already informed me that Shensi will need rations as well.” She nodded to the cat. “We can see to that.”

  Addie looked relieved. Of course, that was her concern. It hadn’t escaped my notice that the Levelian captain took more kindly to the unexpected animal on her ship than she did the four men.

  “That’s all you need to concern yourself with. I’ve reset the cabin locks. Choose yours and place your palm over it. It will accept only two identities before opening as there are only two beds in each cabin. Hopefully, our time together will be brief.” With that, the blunt woman walked back the way we had come.

  Addie walked toward the cabins like she was walking toward the gallows. I couldn’t blame her. I hadn’t been sleeping so well myself. Everything that had happened the last few months brought back memories better left alone, and I well-knew the feeling of dreading what the night brought.

  Besides, I wasn’t looking forward to forced quality time with Xavier. I debated asking Gunther to switch cabins, but that was childish, even for me. Especially after I had publicly announced I wasn’t sharing with Locke.

  Gunther was the first to try out the mechanism, choosing the first door on the right. “It gets warm,” he said, practically dancing with excitement over the technology.

  Locke placed his palm on it after Gunther, face impassive as always. The lock clicked, and Gunther pushed the door open.

  “See you in the morning,” Gunther said.

  Locke peered at Addie a moment, who raised her head and kept her face carefully neutral. He disappeared into the room and shut the door.