Finding Destiny

by Jean Johnson

  He stroked her cheek again, seeing more than just her hands tremble, while feeling the sharp increase in her power. His caress was part his own effort and part the effort of the wind-tugged deck tilting beneath their braced feet. As lightly as he touched her, she didn’t falter, let alone fall. Alright, so that isn’t it. What, then, would be my “gentlest touch” if not the lightest stroke of my hand?

  Rain washed over the deck, while the relatively gentler waves of earlier grew coarse and choppy, turning that chilly, murky shade of gray that made even seasoned sailors move carefully abovedeck. The Jenodan Sea, while reputedly not as salty as the great oceans of the world, was large enough that one could not see the far side, and its waters could get quite cold and rough in bad weather, even in the summer.

  Inside their spell-shielded bubble, the two of them were growing hot. Beads of sweat dusted her forehead and cheeks, while the folds of both his jacket and his trousers clung to the warmer spots of his skin. Over their heads, sparks fell in silent sprays, further warming the air.

  Panting audibly with her effort, Mita licked her lips. Somehow, she managed to speak. Not to move, for her physical hands were caught in the invisible vice of his power, body locked into the illusion cast by her mind ... but she did speak. “You’re ... very strong. You’re wasted ... as a ship’s mage.”

  “It was a temporary job at best,” Ellett murmured, watching her moisten her lips a second time. He, too, was beginning to sweat, though given how much he and his fellow Guardsmen had practiced such things, he didn’t have to struggle to speak. “One which I took on just long enough to find you.”

  “Find me? You knew who ... to look for?” she panted, looking into his eyes as if she could read the answer written in them.

  She was tall enough to look him in the eyes, for hers were within a few inches of his own, and he wasn’t a short man. Their bodies almost brushed with each ship-rocking gust of wind. Ellett gently stroked her cheek, considering her words, her features, and the strength of her magics. Her very strong magics. She hadn’t stopped increasing her power, though her muscles shook with the effort of it, trembling like the sparks sputtering their silent points of light overhead. As did his, though at least he could still move.

  The worst thing he had to fight was how the sight of her licking those full lips distracted him, weakening his concentration. “Not who, just what ... though I am very happy I found you.”

  Wanting—needing—to end this conflict without either of them getting hurt, Ellett leaned in just far enough to close the gap between their heads. His lips touched hers, more of a brushing brought on by the swaying of the deck underfoot than any deliberate press ... but by her reaction, it was a devastating blow. Crying out, she buckled and dropped hard to one knee, her magical strength faltering.

  Instantly, he gentled his mental pressure, not wanting to break her fingers. She tried to recoup her energies, to resurge them into another attack, but it was too late. The Dueling shield vanished, popping like a soap bubble and letting in the lashing rain. The moment her leg had bent to the deck, she had lost, for it was a very rare mage who could regather enough strength to continue. Keenly aware of the stunned looks and dark glares being aimed at him by her crewmates, Ellett dipped to one knee as well. He caught her hands as she flexed life back into her fingers, and gently chafed them between his palms.

  “You are incredibly strong and incredibly talented. Your cloaking illusions were near-perfect, the best I’ve ever seen,” he praised her quietly. “I’d consider it an honor if you’d teach me some of what you know.”

  She looked up at him, startled by his words.

  Ellett struck his next unconventional blow by slicing one hand horizontally through the air, silently carving the very air. A cupping flex of his fingers forced the wind up and over the black-hulled ship, quelling some of the waves and calming the unruly rocking of the deck. The move lessened some of the falling rain, too.

  It was a showy display of his power, for not many mages could have cast such a demanding spell so soon after arcane combat. Not that it didn’t cost him, for it did—it was all he could do to hide his trembling, though he couldn’t do anything about the sweat trickling down his face—but it impressed the woman Mita and her startled crew. Helping her to her feet, Ellett cupped her hand in his and held her wary, wondering gaze.

  “Now. Let us set sail for Jetta, where you will point out this impostor who claims to be the late Lord Stelled. Once I have confirmed he is an impostor, he will be dealt with appropriately. In the meantime, you and I will fill the hours and the days of our trip with conversation. You, by discussing in detail each and every offense that Jetta feels has been wrought against it by the people and the government, and me, by listening and giving what facts I can from the Aurulan point of view in all of these matters. Like civilized people do.”

  She blinked at him, then narrowed her eyes. “And do civilized people go around kissing other people without either invitation or permission?”

  Leaning close, Ellett murmured in her ear. “Only when first defeated by your beauty.”

  With her hazel eyes wide with surprise and her tanned cheeks flushed with pleasure, she looked very lovely indeed. Not the loveliest woman he had ever seen, if one counted strictly by facial features, but she was quick, intelligent, and strong-willed. Such things held an attraction of their own. Which meant that no sooner had he said the words than he realized they were true, and not just a method to distract her. To an extent. He hadn’t earned the rank of Mage-Captain by being easily distracted or swayed.

  Apparently, she hadn’t earned the respect of the men and women around her by being easily swayed, either. Narrowing her eyes, she gripped his hand tightly in hers, though at least she spoke equally quietly in his ear. “Not without knowing the authority you carry to do such a thing, and not without it being tested on a Truth Stone. One which I have made, for I do not trust anything Lord Stelled has claimed on his own.”

  “Not in front of your crew,” he countered. “You have earned some of my respect and a chance to earn my trust. They have not. And you will give me your word of honor you will not mention it to them.”

  “You want me to swear a mage-oath?” Mita scoffed.

  Ellett shook his head. “No. I want you to give me your word of honor. Just you saying that you will keep my full identity to yourself, until I deem it appropriate to tell anyone else. If you break it, then I will know you are untrustworthy. Forcing you via magic to keep your word does nothing to help you prove your good character.”

  She studied him a long moment, then pulled her hands free and picked up her fallen kerchiefs. Straightening, she turned to face her crewmates. “Pick up the mist-net, and weigh anchor. Head south. For now. You, come with me.”

  “Captain ... ?” one of the crewmen questioned.

  “I’m going to interrogate him. If I like what I hear, we’ll head for Jetta. If I don’t ... he’ll be sent down below—I do hope you know a good water-breathing spell,” she added to Ellett over her shoulder.

  He smiled back, amused by the threat. “It’s not raining that hard.”

  Humor gleamed briefly in her eyes, then she descended to the middeck. Ellett picked up his bag and followed. One of the men on the foredeck shouted an order to the middeck crew, which their bo’sun picked up, blowing first an odd melody on his pipe, then the by-now-familiar tune for hauling a ship’s anchor out of the water.

  At least I’ll no longer have to go round and round the rim of the Jenodan Sea, waiting for these people to show up. And I won’t have to listen to that shrill whistle being piped day and night for much longer. Following the armor-clad mage all the way back to her cabin under the aft deck, Ellett closed and latched the door behind him. The room wasn’t large; in fact, it took up barely half the space. Another door led off to the right, possibly to private quarters, or maybe to storage, he didn’t know.

  Unlatching one of the drawers at her desk, she pulled out a familiar, palm-sized disc. There w
ere several variations on truth-sensing Artifacts, even some spells which could be applied in an impromptu manner, but the stones, while not as cheap as Truth Wands, were the most commonly used. The balance of truth versus lie could be seen by just how much a lie darkened the purified marble.

  She came back, picked up his hand, and placed the stone in it, curling his fingers around the edges. “Tell me true. Is Lord Stelled, cousin to your Seer King, truly dead? And did you confirm this with your own eyes?”

  “I am a blue seagull.”

  THREE

  At her bemused look, he glanced pointedly down at the stone disc cupped in his fingers. She released his hand, allowing the blackened imprint of his digits to show. That proved the spells embedded in the Artifact were still viably strong.

  The marks faded after a moment. Re-gripping the edges, Ellett gave her the truth. “I was present when the search team brought his remains down from the mountains, and when the healers and mages had scried the truth of his identity, and the means of his death.

  “I also personally carried word to His Majesty, Seer King Devin, just under three years ago that the son of the daughter of his great-uncle, his third cousin, Lord Stelled the alchemist, died of a heart attack while gathering rare herbs in the mountains.” Uncurling his fingers, he displayed the all-white stone. Clenching it again, he added, “Furthermore, to the best of my considerable knowledge of such matters, no ambassador, envoy, or official government representative is currently assigned to Jetta Freeport to represent any official Aurulan interests. Our last envoy of any sort, before myself of course, was sent after the fourth of our ships was pillaged this year.”

  A brief revelation showed his words were true. Ellett continued briskly.

  “Our envoy reported that he was forced to retreat rapidly no more than half an hour after landing. He had found himself being pursued by a mob determined to paint him with your black Jettan tar and hang him for his ‘crimes,’ claiming at the top of their lungs that he was a child molester. Needless to say, he didn’t consider it safe enough to stay in port long enough to prove the falsehood of such claims ... and His Majesty didn’t care to endanger any of his other subjects.”

  The disc remained white. Outside the cabin, they could hear the muffled sound of the anchor chain clanking its way up the side of the ship, and the orders being barked by the bo’sun to unfurl the sails, adding to the pattering of the rain falling on the deck.

  “So you are the new envoy, is that it?” Mita asked him, leaning back on the thick-lipped edge of her desk. Like most furniture on a ship, it was bolted to the deck and didn’t move.

  “Not quite. I have been directed by His Majesty to put an end to the piracy plaguing Aurulan ships and Aurulan shores,” he corrected her. “How I am to do so is mostly up to me. And you.”

  This time, when he revealed the Truth Stone, the polished marble surface was mottled by a silver gray imprint of his fingers. Mita arched one of her brows. “Is it, now? Care to clarify why that’s ever so slightly a lie?”

  Clutching the stone, Ellett restated, “Correction. How I am to do so is partially dictated by one of His Majesty’s prophesies ... but being a prophecy, the wording is vague, and the interpretation of said words is still very much a matter of my free will.”

  Now there was no blemish on the stone. He started to hand it back to her, but she folded her arms across her leather-guarded chest. “We’re not done just yet. You haven’t said who you are, nor what rank or authority you have, that you can claim to speak on behalf of your king.”

  “Give me your word you won’t mention it to your crew, and I’ll tell you,” he countered. The ship swayed sluggishly. Guessing it was now under power from the wind reduced by his most recent spell, Ellett lifted his hand and withdrew the magic dividing the wind, tapering its effects down as he pulled the energies back into himself. The rigging creaked audibly, reverberating through the ship, and they could hear the sails fluttering and snapping as they were hauled up into place.

  Mita eyed him for a long moment, then lifted her pointed chin. “Alright. You have my word of honor I will keep your identity a secret from my crew. For now. For as long as it takes us to sail to Jetta.”

  “For longer than that,” Ellett bartered. “If this impostor has fooled all of you into believing him—and nothing I have heard of you Jettans makes me believe you are lifelong fools—then it’s clear he’s taken pains to make sure his identity will not be unmasked by any Aurulan official. He might even have spies among your crew.”

  “Not my crew,” she boasted. “I handpicked them myself. We don’t discuss our secrets with outsiders.”

  Ellett smiled wryly. “That may be, but this isn’t one of your secrets, so they may not consider it important enough to keep. And they may not spy directly for this impostor, but if even they just talked about me within the hearing of one of his actual informants ...”

  “Fine. I give you my word I’ll keep silent about your source of authority until you give me leave to discuss it and you. Now, who are you, Ellett of Aurul?” she asked. “Presuming that is your name. Ellett is a fairly common one among both Aurulans and Keketites.”

  “I am anything but common, milady. In specific, I am Mage-Captain Ellett, head of the Royal Guard of the Seer King.” That much widened her eyes. He confirmed it by displaying the unblemished stone in his grip. Ellett gave her a small smile, enjoying her reaction. “As I said, I am sent by His Majesty ... speaking with the words of our God, Ruul. I can do almost anything I like regarding you and your people to get you to stop pillaging our ships, and it will be acceptable in the eyes of my liege and my Patron.

  “Be happy I’m interested in talking with you, rather than ‘sending you down below’ as you so charmingly put it.” Lobbing the all-white stone at her, he watched her catch it. “Now, a few questions for you. What is your position in all of this? What rank or position do you hold in Jetta, and who or what gives you the authority to take up vengeance against Aurulans in the name of your people?”

  She eyed the disc in her hand, then him. “How much do you know about the freeport?”

  “Not much. You’re a closemouthed lot. It’s a way station for a lot of cross-sea trade. You have massive warehouses, you guarantee the safety of all goods held in storage—some of it expensive stasis-enspelled storage, which is often used for food products and delicate herbs until more profitable times of the year come around. You build some of the fastest ships on the sea, magic notwithstanding. You also don’t have a Patron Deity, though you’ve somehow managed to retain your freedom from would-be conquerors for over four hundred years,” Ellett recited, listing the highlights. “And the most peculiar thing of all, when asked who your leader is, you Jettans change the subject. Repeatedly.”

  Mita stared at him a long, long moment, mulling something over. She seemed to make up her mind, drawing in a deep breath and letting it out. “Swear on your powers as a mage that you’ll keep the identity of our leadership and the source of our freedom a secret, and I’ll tell you.”

  Curiosity prodded him into agreeing, but Ellett didn’t do so carelessly. “I, Mage-Captain Ellett, bind unto my powers this vow: That if the identity of the leadership of Jetta Freeport and the source of its freedom from outside conquest all these years does not harm the sovereign kingdom of Aurul or myself, I shall keep the secret of both these things from non-Jettan sovereign citizens, until given leave to discuss them by Captain Mita or anyone else of an equal or higher Jettan rank ... but I do reserve the right to both speak and act freely as needed in the defense of myself or my homeland, should that need arise. So say I, Mage-Captain Ellett of the Aurulan Royal Guard.”

  His skin tingled, and the glow of energy sweeping over him briefly brightened the interior of the cabin.

  “So you’re a law-sayer, too?” Mita asked sardonically. “Do you really think that’s the best vow you could make?”

  He shrugged. “It’s the best you’ll get.”

  Again, she studied him for
a long moment. The hissing of the rain hitting the deck overhead, the creaking of the wind straining against the sails, and the splashing of the waves breaking against the hull filled the silence between them. Finally, she spoke. “The island on which Jetta is built shelters a Fountain. One of those rare and extremely powerful singularity-wells of magical energy. Its exact location isn’t important to you, but its Guardian is the leader of our city and the defender of our lands. We do not need a Patron Deity to defend ourselves.

  “We also have a higher-than-average ratio of mages born to our population, small though it is, and thus we run a local, private Academy to train our mages. A number of them are agriculture specialists, as the rocky terrain of the Jenodan Isles isn’t the most hospitable for growing food—wine, yes, but food, no. Most of the rest either work for the various warehouse, merchanter, and transport companies, or as Aquamancers, ship’s mages, shipbuilders, and other forms of spellcasters,” Mita informed him. Then she smiled slightly. “And all of us are trained to defend our homeland. Even if we must be aggressive about it, sometimes.”

  “A little too aggressive,” Ellett pointed out. He held up his hand as she stiffened, her hazel eyes narrowing. “However it came about, you now have official Aurulan attention. Open-minded attention. I suggest we focus on creating peaceful ties between our lands. Speaking of which, you’ve mentioned your leadership, but not your position in it. I presume it has something to do with the strength of your magic?”

  “Something like that. I’m the commander of our flagship, the Jetta’s Pride,” Mita said, spreading her hands and giving him a slight bow of self-introduction. “Not quite the admiral of the Fleet, but he’s still in the prime of his life, and a better strategist than I am. Not to mention his wife is our Spymaster, with contacts in every single port around the sea—we trade in information as well as goods, you see. It’s one of the factors that helps keep any would-be conquerors in check while they’re still just thinking about heading our way.”