The Forgotten World

by Robin D. Mahle

  I bit back a sigh at the thought of her name. Seeing her proud stance when she left the room earlier would have gutted me, if there had been anything left in me to feel that way.

  I walked along the edge of the deck, carefully avoiding the working women. The beams of sun outlined enormous dark shapes in the still black waters around us, some easily larger than our entire ship. None had bothered us so far, but I wondered how long that luck would hold out.

  On a ship full of seasoned warriors, I could only hope we would be safe either way. Not that I cared for my sake, but at least she would be safe.

  Not that she needed me to be concerned about that. Her enormous bodyguard Locke had scarcely left her side in the days since…

  I let the thought trail off, reaching for the handle to the storage door. Though the room assaulted me with memories, there was a relief in being here as well. Namely, one large barrel of relief. I grabbed one of the casks used for water and filled it with Greaser instead.

  Tonight, there would be no dancing under the stars, no confessions or accidental marriages or perfect, soul-stirring joinings with the most beautiful, complicated woman in the world. But maybe, at least, there would be peace.

  The Analyst

  BeLa’s next star went wide.

  “Focus, darling. The world will never stop moving around you. You have to find your own stillness, your own peace.”

  BeLa took a deep steadying breath and focused on the target ahead, waiting for her mother to give the order.

  “Again,” the captain finally said.

  PeNelope’s arrow and BeLamere’s deadly star raced once more to the center of the target, landing within a centimeter of each other. A small shriek of excitement escaped BeLa’s lips at finally succeeding.

  She would never have the physical strength to pull a bow or wield a sword, nor the desire, so she and her mother had compromised on more subtle defense arts. On various poisons and tranquilizers that could be administered easily, by being contained within a ring or a necklace or coated onto a dagger. Or her personal favorite, a throwing star.

  The captain smiled proudly.

  “Very good, girls.” She turned to BeLa. “As I said, you don’t necessarily need to be warriors, but you do need to protect yourself.” SuEllen’s features hardened.

  “From what?” There was no bite to BeLa’s tone, only open curiosity.

  Levelia was a land of trained soldiers with no war to fight in. Long-ingrained notions of always being ready for the next battle hadn’t left the mentality of their people, despite years of relative peace. Attacks from wild animals weren’t even something to really worry about. Anything vicious enough to attack a human had been culled from the population years ago.

  “You never know,” her mother responded.

  BeLamere had never excelled at reading expressions and intentions the way Nell did, but something pinching at the corner of her mother’s eyes made BeLa think the captain was lying.

  That perhaps there was a known threat and her mother just wasn’t telling them what it was.

  Chapter Three

  Adelaide

  Despite our setbacks, the signal from the General’s ship remained trackable, if a bit inconsistent. Every so often, I would catch SuEllen glancing warily at the crystal in her armband while the light dimmed from it. Somehow, though, we had managed to reconnect with them so far.

  “Shouldn’t they be having as hard a time as we are?” I asked the captain finally.

  “Their crystal is giving them a direct course. Mine only gives us a vague idea of whether we’ve lost them.” She shot another worried glance toward the flickering light of her armband.

  Before I could question her further, the boat rocked with a sudden force.

  Dark, squirmy shapes emerged from the water and wrapped themselves around the boat. Tentacles.

  Neither the men nor the Levelians hesitated before jumping into action, slashing and hacking at the digits. Arrows bounced off the thick, armored exterior, and even Locke’s sword couldn’t penetrate the thing.

  A sharp crack sounded, the wood of the deck railing splintering. I ran to the center of the ship. Maybe I couldn’t help, but I couldn’t just go below.

  A warrior-like roar sounded as one of the things wrapped around SeRavi. She jammed her dagger into the tentacle, and it sunk hilt-deep into the digit.

  “Go for the cracks in the armor, underneath-” She had only barely gotten the last word out when the thing dunked forcibly into the water.

  “No!” I screamed, lunging forward. I wasn’t the only one. The Levelians attacked in full force, but they were still having to fend off several other digits that were invading the ship, searching for targets with whatever kind of senses the thing had.

  When they finally managed to sever the enormous tentacle entirely, it wasn’t nearly soon enough.

  I watched, frozen, as SuEllen and another woman pulled SeRavi’s lifeless, broken body from the sea. My teacher, the woman who had given me my strength and my confidence back. I had never even thanked her.

  And now I never will.

  “Addie!” Clark’s voice pulled me from my trance. His face was slack with terror on the deck above me. I turned in time to see a giant shape hurtling toward me.

  Clark was sprinting to me, but there was no way he would make it before this thing dragged me into the black, churning sea. Despite my efforts to dodge, the thing managed to get a hold on me.

  I stabbed my knife into the tentacle wrapped around my waist, managing to get in between the plated, crustacean-like armor. It didn’t so much as flinch. The more I struggled, the harder the thing squeezed, until I couldn’t take a breath.

  I clawed frantically at it, wiggling my knife and using what little strength I had, but it was no good. The pressure on my ribs intensified. One of them was going to crack soon from the force of the tentacle, if I didn’t suffocate before then.

  My movements stilled, every ounce of my energy sapped away without oxygen to fuel my movements. Just as I resigned myself to meeting SeRavi’s grim fate, the clean arc of a sword sliced the edge of the writhing digit neatly off.

  It squelched and clattered to the floor, my knife still embedded in its flesh. Locke looked me over with a worried eye, pulling my blade out and handing it over by the now slime-covered handle. Still, I took it gratefully into my shaking hands.

  Somehow, we managed to injure the thing enough for it to slink back down into the murky depths from which it had appeared. But it was not without cost, and SeRavi was not the only casualty.

  I numbly walked from the showers to my room clad in only a towel. I had been so desperate to wash the slimy filth off, I hadn’t stopped for clothes on the way. I had cleaned the clockwork heart locket that contained my sister’s ashes as well as I could, fighting back tears when memories of Gunther taking it to clean sprang unbidden into my mind.

  No sooner had the door clanged shut than I jumped, startled to find I wasn’t alone.

  Clark waited for me on my bed. He must have found somewhere to rinse off and change clothes as well, because there was no trace of the monster on him.

  I hesitated, unsure what to do or what he wanted. His presence in my room wasn’t exactly commonplace these days.

  Clark was up and standing in front of me in two long strides, his face a distraught mixture of guilt and regret and worry.

  He ran his hands over me gently, from my head to my face, down my bare, damp shoulders. My lips parted and my breath came faster, my body responding instinctively to his.

  “Addie, I thought…” He didn’t finish, and he didn’t have to.

  I knew what he thought, so close after Gunther. His mouth was so close to mine, and we hadn’t so much as been in the same room for days. I leaned forward, covering his mouth with mine before I had time to consider the likelihood of rejection.

  He kissed me back ferociously, though, pushing me against the door with a thunk.

  “I’m s—” he began, but I stopped his
apology with my lips pushing even more firmly against his. My fists clenched in his shirt, pulling him tighter against me, and I let the towel slide to the floor. He groaned softly, strong hands gripping my hips and erasing every last inch of space between us.

  Blood rushed, hot and furious, through every part of my body. I pushed him toward my bed, the bed we had shared for far too short a time, and he froze.

  No, no, no. He is not doing this to me again.

  His eyes snapped open, no longer clouded with lust but hard, distant. Apparently, he is.

  “I can’t do this, Addie.”

  Can’t do what?

  My heart dropped into my stomach, and I fought hard for composure against the panic and pain shoving their way up through my throat. He backed away.

  Cold air brushed against my skin, suddenly too exposed. I calmly made my way to my drawers. There was no way I was going to cover myself like I had something to hide in front of a man who had seen it all anyway.

  With my back still turned, I finally choked out my vital point of clarification.

  “Can’t do this?” I turned and gestured vaguely between us, referencing the physical contact. “Or can’t do any of this with me?”

  If the question surprised him, he didn’t show it. It was more like he had been waiting for me to bring it up.

  “I don’t know right now.”

  It was like the tentacle was wrapped around me again, sucking the air from my lungs. I turned back, pulling a night shirt on as quickly as I could without looking like I was rushing. Then, in as even a voice as I could manage.

  “Well, I certainly won’t force you.”

  He pulled in a breath like he might respond, opening his mouth, then closing it. Finally, he turned and left without voicing whatever it was he was thinking.

  It was probably for the best, given that I had run completely out of composure by then.

  I sank to the floor, trying to muffle my sobs until he was too far to be able to hear them through the door. First, I had lost my mother and sister. Then Gunther. And now I was losing Clark.

  I didn’t even have the strength to care about how broken that would make me.

  The Analyst

  “I don’t even know why she makes me sit there when she knows I’m never going to be Queen anyway,” Nell fumed, pacing back and forth.

  The queen insisted the princesses rotate sitting with her at court, and it was Nell’s least favorite day of the week.

  “Perhaps it doesn’t have a tangible value, but rather an emotional one?” BeLa offered.

  “You think she wants to spend time with me? Doubtful.” Nell stared at the ground.

  BeLa wasn’t sure Nell was being entirely reasonable, but it would likely be unhelpful to point that out. Or so her mother had explained to her in the past.

  So instead, she held out an instrument to Nell. Distraction might serve to rationalize her.

  “Since you’re here, hold this for me,” BeLa instructed her.

  “What is it?” Nell asked, the diversion already serving its purpose.

  “It’s similar to the serum used to remove the marriage tattoos.”

  The queen truly didn’t spend much time with her children between her experiments and the demands of being a ruler. But BeLa didn’t think that meant she didn’t want to. In any event, BeLa seemed to be the only person in the family who had inherited the woman’s interest in medicine.

  “Only, it works faster.”

  “Hoping your mother will use it?” Nell wasn’t entirely joking.

  BeLa would never truly want that, because she and Nell would no longer be family, technically speaking. Divorce was rare in Levelia and nearly unheard of in the royal family.

  But BeLa’s father was not a kind man. She would never understand why her mother had married him to begin with. She could only be grateful that, for most of her life, he had stayed in separate chambers and largely left them alone. Until he talked about marrying her off.

  Fortunately, even a prince had less power than the Captain of the Guard, especially as the latter was always female. It was the way of their society. As long as her mother was here, her father had no power over BeLa’s future.

  Chapter Four

  Clark

  This wasn’t my first ship’s funeral, but it was my first Levelian one. Xav had patched up who he could, and of course there were the women that had disappeared into the sea, but there were two additional casualties on board.

  RoSa, the beautiful woman who had approached me in the store room that day, and LeLani, an older woman I had never had much contact with.

  Stringed instruments strummed out a warrior’s farewell. Nell recited a passage in ancient Levelian, eyes hard, while SuEllen wrapped the bodies. But to my surprise, it was Addie who approached the corpses with three hooks in her hand, eyes wide with sorrow.

  She leaned down and kissed the first woman, RoSa, on the forehead, then squeezed her eyes shut to prepare for her next task. Her hand moved to plunge one of the hooks through her nose in the tradition of sailors. It caught halfway, though.

  Why are they making her take the worst part of this?

  Her shaking fingers fought to pull it, and just as I saw panic bubble up into her eyes, my brother came behind her and helped to guide it the rest of the way.

  She nodded gratefully, then went to SeRavi next. Here, she lingered. Her mouth moved, forming the words “thank you” before she kissed her forehead as well. This time, there was no hesitation. She efficiently plunged the hook through SeRavi’s nose, staring unflinchingly into her face as she did so.

  By the time she got to LeLani, she was moving on autopilot. I knew in some faraway part of my mind that I should have been the one to help her through this, should have been the one at her side when she was attacked earlier. Instead, I stood there, motionless, and let Xavier handle it.

  It made sense, now, why she was the one sending them off. I would recognize that mask of guilt she wore anywhere. She had volunteered because she had pushed this course of action, and now she was taking their deaths on herself.

  And I’m the last person to be able to comfort her there.

  I was struggling to make it through the day as it was. We hadn’t held a funeral for Gunther. Hadn’t had a body to mourn or achieve any sense of closure with. Not that there was closure for something like that.

  Xav came to stand next to me, posture tense and features strained, and I knew he was thinking the same things. Wondering why I was standing over here instead of comforting my wife. Wondering if we would ever get to give our brother the sendoff he deserved.

  We had talked about it more than once. There was no way Gunther had survived that wound, no way anyone could. Jayce seemed to be the only invincible person we knew, and that wouldn’t last long once I got my hands on the little weasel.

  If Addie hadn’t killed him with that blast from the amulet, I would the next time we met. I had never killed anyone before, but Jayce felt like a good place to start.

  If I even saw him again. If we ever saw anyone again.

  The captain had been so focused on those she had lost, she hadn’t addressed the damage to the ship, but I knew it had to be significant. My little brother might have been able to rig something up if he was here — I shoved away the thought. But he wasn’t, and no one had close to his level of genius on this ship. In the world, really.

  When the funeral concluded, Xav and I made our way to the captain’s cabin. Nell was there, of course, along with Locke. And she was there, eyes still gleaming but stubborn chin held high.

  “The ship has been damaged,” SuEllen announced unnecessarily. “We have days, at most, and that’s assuming no more storms or attacks.”

  As bad as that news was, I could tell there was something else. She exchanged a glance with Nell, and Addie’s eyes shot to the captain’s arm band.

  “We’ve lost them, haven’t we.” There was no questioning lilt to Addie’s tone, only bone-deep defeat.

  SuEllen
and Nell nodded in unison.

  “So, what’s the plan?” I asked after a tense moment of silence.

  “We search for land,” Nell offered. “Something with resources to repair our ship.”

  “In the Tempest Sea?” Xavier laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Not bloody likely, is it?”

  “No.” SuEllen’s face was grave. “It isn’t.”

  The Analyst

  BeLa paced her large room. Despite the space, each available surface was covered in books and medical tools she’d been studying. Her mother repeated her statement, and BeLa frowned.

  “You’re leaving me here...with him?” she asked.

  SuEllen sighed and stepped closer, placing a gentle hand on BeLa’s cheek.

  “You have nothing to fear from your father, darling. He knows full well he would not survive my homecoming if he mistreated you in any way.”

  BeLa’s brows knitted together while she mulled that over. It was true, he had never laid a hand on BeLa, but there was something in his gaze that unnerved her. She had always been a good judge of character, and something about her father sent alarm bells ringing in her head.

  Her mother was right, though. Not one person in Levelia was brave enough to cross the Captain of the Guard, and her father was no exception.

  “Let’s talk about something happier, now.” The Captain smiled.

  “What could be happy when you’re leaving for an entire month? What if you don’t return?”

  “It’s only a scouting mission to look into some unrest below. Their primitive technology can’t touch ours, and the queen will zap me right back here if there’s any real danger. You know she always keeps an eye out.”

  This was true, too. The queen had eyes everywhere. BeLa nodded and breathed out a small sigh of relief.