by Alex Aster
“Nearly there!” a voice said through the downpour, and Tor slumped over in relief. He felt the waves get smaller and smaller beneath him, as they navigated out of the open water and closer to the coast.
The rain thinned, and he stood once more.
Just ahead sat a town with a harbor that only fit one ship.
He made port, then went below.
“Tor, you’re pale as bone!” Melda said, her rage from yesterday all but forgotten. He stumbled past her to his room, where he changed into fresh clothing and tried his best to get warm. Still, even though he wore many layers, and Melda shoved tea at him the moment he left his cabin, his chest felt hollow as honeycomb.
“Are you sure you want to go now?” she asked him, a worried expression on her face. He must have looked terrible.
“We’re so close.” Tor said, his own weak voice surprising him. “The Calavera captain and his allies could get here at any moment. We can’t wait.”
Melda nodded, not looking convinced, but not saying anything more. Engle joined them, and he smiled, though it did not reach his eyes.
“Whatever happens, it was an adventure,” he said, outstretching his hand, lifeline up.
“To adventure,” Melda said, her voice thick. Tears gathered in her eyes like storm clouds. She pressed her lifeline to his.
“To adventure,” Tor finished, holding his palm to both of theirs.
And then they climbed up the stairs toward whatever awaited them above.
* * *
The town looked abandoned. It was just a cluster of stone houses and empty streets—yet Tor swore he saw someone rush to close their shutters.
He stepped onto a creaking dock that threatened to collapse at any moment. Vesper was behind him, holding the compass, which had gone deathly still.
She took a step off the ship, and Tor watched the needle whip to the side. He followed where it pointed, and froze. Something at his core yawned and stretched, slowly awakening.
There was an isle a mile away from the docks, connected to the town by a narrow land bridge, ocean raging on either side. He felt connected to it, tethered by an invisible piece of thread. And something on the other side tugged him forward.
“It’s a tidal island,” Melda said. “Just like in the book. The land bridge is only visible during low tide.” It was made up of a single, looming mountain, with a tower at its very top.
“We better start walking then,” Engle said.
The land bridge, crafted from sand and crushed-up shell that crunched beneath their boots, was so narrow only two of them fit across. The sea lapped at its either side, splashing them with spray. Rain pummeled them in painful streaks, the wind roaring in Tor’s ears, angry like the ocean, which was a terrifying, deep blue—impossible to see through. When they were halfway across, Tor looked around. He was far out into the sea. Tor felt like he was walking on water—just like he had once done with the Night Witch—rather than on a narrow sand bridge through it.
“Do you see a way up?” Melda asked Engle, nodding toward the mountain ahead. It was larger than Tor thought, the tower atop dwarfed by its size.
Engle nodded. “There’s a path, an ancient staircase that doesn’t look very sturdy.”
Gray-tinged, angry clouds had trailed them, taking turns cracking open. A flash of lightning illuminated the tower, and Tor saw a long window at its very top.
He wondered if the pearl was in that room.
“Can you see into the tower?” Tor asked. Sightseers’ eyes were much more sensitive than others’, since they worked so much harder. It would require Engle to use his see-through vision, something he could only do occasionally, when the weather was right.
A roar of thunder shook the ground underfoot. Tor swallowed. The weather definitely did not seem right.
“No. I can’t.”
The sea sloshed even more furiously now, the ocean beginning to encroach on the land bridge, though it was still low tide. Tor walked faster, body already aching from steering the ship through the storm. He looked at his friends, heads down against the wind, shoulders hunched, pushing forward nonetheless, and he became resolute as marble.
Whatever happened didn’t matter. If his friends survived, that would be enough. That would always be enough. He chanted the words on a loop in his head until they reached the base of the mountain.
A tiny ring of sand circled the towering peak, and, as they stepped upon it, even more clouds broke open and soaked the ground beneath their feet, as if already grieving something terrible.
“This way,” Engle said, wiping long strands of light brown hair out of his eyes. The stairs began at the left end of the mountain and wrapped around its back, all the way up to the tower. Engle was right, they looked ancient—each step a misshapen rock, barely holding on.
“Careful on your way up,” Melda said, tying her hair back with one of her ribbons. “The rocks are slippery, and falling would be deadly.”
The higher they climbed, the truer her statement became. One wrong step, one fallen stair, and they could all go tumbling to their deaths. The sea crested wildly, all whitecaps now.
“Watch out!” Engle said, as a wave fifty feet high rushed right toward them. Tor pressed himself against the mountain, trapped, nowhere to go but up. But Melda was at the front, and she stood frozen in fear, staring at the rushing water.
Just short of them, the wave finally crested and crashed against the cliff, right below their feet. The ice-cold spray showered Tor, and Melda gasped. Salt in her eyes, she took a wrong next step and fell—
Only for Engle to grab her by the back of her shirt. “The water’s rising,” Engle said, voice trembling. “Go, go!”
Melda turned and began running up the steps, her boots squeaking against the wet stone. Engle was behind her, then Vesper, then Tor. Captain Forecastle was at the very end, coughing as he rushed to keep up. Tor’s chest felt frozen solid, his lungs hurting with every breath. He was soaking wet and freezing.
He slowed down to wait for the pirate, but Forecastle waved him away. “If we’re meant to go, we’d be happy to be buried in the sea.”
Another wave crashed, higher, inching closer with every moment. Rock crumbled from the mountain, down into the abyss. Tor knew he couldn’t drown, but wondered if he would survive falling into the frigid water.
He watched the tide pull out the water below them to form another massive wave, leaving hundreds of rocks, sharp as knives, in its wake. He swallowed. He might not drown, but if the freezing water didn’t kill him, those would.
The rain blurred his vision almost completely now, coming at him sideways. He didn’t dare stop and kept his eyes on his feet, his hair wet and dripping across his face. Thunder rumbled above his head, followed by a long strike of lightning that seemed dangerously close.
“Just a few more steps!” Melda yelled from the front. Then, sooner than Tor had expected, he heard the loud creak of a rusty door opening.
He tumbled into the tower, slipping and falling onto his knees. He coughed, his chest incredibly tight.
The thread pulling him to the isle tugged yet again. Tor looked up and saw that the tower was a lighthouse with spiral stairs to its top.
“There,” he said, voice barely making a sound. “It’s there.” He started up the stairs, and the rest followed. “No.” He turned around. “Stay. Please. We don’t know what’s upstairs or what will happen. We don’t all have to go.”
Melda stepped forward. “No. You did this last time. Engle and I stayed behind and you had to face the Night Witch alone.” She shook her head, resolute, and Tor knew there was no changing her mind. “Never again. We go together.”
With Tor at the front, they ascended. At the top, there was a hatch.
He opened it.
The peak of the tower was large and domed. The window Tor had seen from below was carved int
o its side, huge and completely open, the storm raging on just beyond it, some rain making its way inside, pounding hard against the smooth stone like knocks on a door. The room was empty, save for one thing.
An oyster shell, sitting in the middle of the floor.
Tor could feel its power buzzing around him, the frenzied ocean waves drawn to it, rushing toward it.
The Pirate’s Pearl. It was inside the oyster shell.
He moved to take it.
A fiery burst of purple lightning lit up the room, striking Tor right in the chest.
“Tor!” Melda screamed, rushing to him. Engle fell to his knees.
But Tor did not move again.
The spectral appeared out of thin air, the Calavera captain at his side, and the Swordscale traitor at his other.
Vesper turned to the spectral and bared her teeth. She made a move to strike him—and, in an instant, the spectral summoned purple flame in his palm, then aimed it at her head.
It flew, but missed, tearing a gaping hole right through the tower instead.
The Swordscale traitor had pushed the spectral aside.
Seeing his chance, Captain Forecastle shot five arrows, one after the other. But this spectral was stronger than the others—it had a smoke wall up in less than a second, blocking every single one. The pirate continued to fire, getting closer. The lighthouse wall on the opposite side was crumbling, disappearing before their very eyes as it tumbled into the sea. The storm found them inside, lightning illuminating the room in terrifying flashes and rolls of thunder masking Melda’s sobs.
Captain Forecastle aimed more arrows, one after the other, pushing the spectral back, getting close enough to make a deadly blow. The spectral narrowed its eyes, and, with a whip of his wrist, brought up a new barrier, purple as his fire. The two arrows hit it, then ricocheted and pierced the pirate right through the stomach. He slumped to the floor.
On the opposite side of the room, Vesper was approaching her brother, who had just saved her from the spectral’s fire. “Calder,” she said. She reached out a hand to her brother. “Please, don’t do this. Not to Swordscale. Not to me.”
For a moment, he hesitated. Then he reached out to take her hand.
Before he could grip her fingers, the spectral struck his chest with a fistful of purple flame. And he was thrown back through the window, down to the rocks below.
Vesper’s scream coincided with another strike of lightning, so loud it seemed to shatter the world.
The spectral opened his hand, and the oyster flew into it, before he and the Calavera captain vanished.
Ship in the Clouds
Time moves differently out in the sea. Days can stretch decades, years can bleed together.
It is said that out in the middle of the ocean, one can glimpse the future, or even the past. Pirate songs sing of ghosts in the night. One too many sailors claim to hear battles years after they’ve taken place, precisely at midnight, cannons sounding through the darkness, screams echoing across the water.
A little girl, the daughter of a rich merchant, once pointed up to the sky and smiled. “There’s a ship there,” she said, waving at invisible passengers.
Her parents thought her silly, perhaps too much time in the sun.
But perhaps the ocean gave the girl a glimpse of what is to come.
20
The Pearl
Tor blinked—and Melda made a sound between a scream and a sob. She rushed toward him with wide eyes and shaking hands, as if not allowing herself to believe it.
Tor blinked again, and Melda sank to her knees, Engle beside her.
“Tor,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “Are you…”
Tor nodded, slowly sitting up. His chest burned and he winced. It felt like the skin there had been charred and cut away.
He pulled down the top of his shirt and saw something glimmering, fresh and still hot to the touch.
A new emblem.
A shield.
“That’s how you survived,” Melda whispered.
Engle’s all-seeing vision locked in on his arm. “Look.”
Right where his leadership bands used to be, wrapped around his left wrist, was a ring of purple flames.
“Another emblem?” Melda said.
He didn’t know.
Blood pooled out of Captain Forecastle. Two arrows stuck out of his stomach.
“Don’t take them out,” Melda said, standing on shaky legs. She looked around for anything to stop the bleeding. But the room was empty. “We have to get him help, now.”
Engle groaned as he lifted the pirate to his feet.
Tor walked toward Vesper, who stared out the lone window. Mouth parted in a silent scream, she watched the waves and rocks below. A single tear slid down her cheek. Her entire face twisted in pain.
But her eyes were angry.
She turned from the window and fled from the tower without a word.
Engle helped Captain Forecastle down the steps, the storm almost over. A light rain still fell, but the waves had settled. The pirate could still move his legs, though his eyes closed, then opened, only to close again.
“Stay awake,” Engle told him, an edge to his voice. “Stairs are no place for a pirate to die.”
They stumbled their way down, easier without the rain blocking their view. Soon, they were on the sand. Vesper was already there, drawing a symbol into the base of the mountain, a marking Tor didn’t recognize.
He kneeled beside her, head lowered, offering his respects. He knew words would never be enough—he didn’t even know what to say.
So he said nothing and sat beside Vesper as her shoulders shook.
She had no family left. Only a grandmother, who was frozen on a Calavera ship.
Without a way out.
Without the pearl.
Vesper stood and Tor followed suit. They made their way after Engle and Melda, who were already a quarter of the way down the land bridge, sharing Captain Forecastle’s weight between them.
It had all been a disaster. They had failed. The spectral and Calavera captain had gotten control of the seas, after everything.
And Vesper’s brother was dead. She had watched him plummet from the tower.
His mother, his sister, his father—their entire village was moments away from being leveled by a tidal wave or attacked by hundreds of bloodthirsty pirates.
They were counting on them…
And he had failed.
They had just caught up to the rest when somewhere, far away, a roar made him go still. Tor turned, and so did Vesper.
He swallowed. A wave half as tall as the mountain raced toward it. It hit, splitting in two. Each part curved and barreled forward, right to where they stood.
High tide was rushing in.
Tor looked one way, then the other. Too much distance between the island and them. Between the docks and them. Vesper and Tor might survive—but his friends. They would drown.
The prophecy.
“Go!” Tor yelled, and they started to run, but the water was at their backs, curling along the sides of the mountain, charging at them at full force. Just seconds away from engulfing them.
Vesper stood very still, as if in a trance. She muttered words beneath her breath, her lips barely moving.
“Hidden in plain sight,” she said quietly. Tor recognized Violet’s words, from when the assassin had described surprising ways to use a magnificate’s emblem. “I feel it now… There it is…hidden in plain sight.”
“What are you doing?” he screamed at her back. She still hadn’t moved an inch, even as the sea rushed in. Tor watched as she unclipped the sundrop salmon’s scale from her bracelet and held it in her palm.
“The pearl wasn’t in the oyster, Tor, the one the spectral took. The oyster was on the pearl.”
�
��What?” Tor said.
Her arm shot out—
And the mountain began to shake.
The salmon scale multiplied her ability, energy emanating from her in waves. Rock crumbled away, the isle breaking into a million pieces that plunged into the sea. The stairs broke apart and toppled, one by one, off the mountain, which still stood tall and rounded. The tower at the top that had housed the oyster snapped in half, then plummeted into the waiting waters, smashing against the rocks below. Vesper cried out in effort, the scale shining bright silver in her hand.
Below the rock of the mountain was sand, and then, in half a second, it all blew away, until Tor could see that it wasn’t a mountain at all.
It was smooth, glimmering white, halfway dug into the sea. Giant, like the moon.
The pearl.
Hidden in plain sight. Made large, instead of small.
Vesper put her other arm up and groaned from the pit of her stomach.
The high tide was just a breath away. Melda screamed as it rushed forward from both directions, trapping them—
With a final groan from Vesper, the pearl shrunk in a flash and propelled into her waiting palm.
She closed her hand—and the sea stopped dead, suspended in midair, lapping against an invisible wall.
* * *
Vesper had held the pearl high until they reached the docks. When she dropped her hand, high tide had rushed forward, swallowing the land bridge, blanketing it completely, as if it had never existed.
Then, safely in the harbor, she sunk to her knees and sobbed.
Captain Forecastle was groaning.
Melda pulled something from her pocket. Her arenahora. Only a shred of sand remained.
They had gotten the pearl. Now, they just needed to get home in time to use it.
There was something else in Melda’s pocket. The telecorp’s coin. She gently approached Vesper, who handed over the scale, her expression never changing.
“If it amplifies power,” Melda said quietly. “It might amplify the coin enough to bring us home.”