by Ted Neill
Mortimer was obsessed as well but in a different way. As the days passed and the wyvern continued to follow, he paced the deck nervously, keeping the egg in his hands at all times. Sometimes he sounded excited as he composed verses about himself, part of an epic poem he surely hoped would be sung around hearth fires for years to come. But other times he would awake in the night or just from a nap screaming with terror.
Even Adamantus was changed. The elk was quiet and tense, no longer lounging in the sun on the deck. Now he always sat like a cat, his legs folded neatly beneath him, ready to spring. He watched the wyvern, but he also kept an eye on Dameon and Mortimer. He warned Gabriella, “Dragons are not creatures that can be tamed. They are cunning, malicious, and unforgiving. She will strike again, but at a time of her choosing.”
That evening, after brief rains, the clouds began to disperse directly over the Elawn. The sky appeared to have been washed clean, and the remaining mist was like lingering soap suds. When her shift was up and Mortimer relieved her, Gabriella went below deck to catch a few hours of sleep. She had not been sleeping well. She was bone-tired, but her mind was like a cart that she simply could not stop as it kept rolling downhill, laden with her thoughts.
The wyvern following off their stern was an obvious worry. How they would return the egg to the wyvern when they reached Nicomedes’ tower was another. So was finding Nicomedes’ tower once they reached Dis. And first they had to find Dis.
There was also the mystery of the map they had retrieved from Nicomedes’ secret workshop. Gabriella hoped it would make more sense when they reached the tower, just like Adamantus had suggested. She had shown the map to Dameon in hopes he might recognize some mathematical pattern to the series of strange shapes. It had kept him occupied for a half day but yielded nothing fruitful.
Then there was their water supply. They had lost too much dousing the fires. Gabriella knew it had been the right choice, although a costly one. The sea was a desert, and crews went mad and died without fresh water. The Elawn had been over an empty stretch of glittering sea for some time now. They had tried to collect some rain water in pots and cups left on deck, but the amount was negligible. Now that the Nested Narrows was behind them, they had seen no islands, not even a rocky atoll. They agreed to ration themselves to two and a half cups of water a day. Gabriella knew Adamantus was drinking even less.
Such thoughts made her thirsty. She ached for sleep, if for nothing else, as a temporary respite from her cares. In the cabin on a bunk, she used Dameon’s method and started counting backwards from one thousand until her thoughts came unglued from one another, and she fell asleep.
Dameon shook Gabriella awake. She tried knocking his hands away and rolling out of his reach, but he was persistent. “Gabriella, you told me to come down here if the dragon got close. The dragon is close. Mr. Creedly is screaming.”
She rolled out of the bunk and raced to above deck. Outside the wyvern was perilously near the Elawn. Her scaled underbelly was just a fishing pole’s reach over the railing. Her right wing flapped above the empty wheel well. Adamantus stood frozen, halfway between the wheel and the wall of the mid-deck where Mortimer was pressed, waving his sword and cradling the egg in his arm.
The agitated wyvern kicked and snapped at the air, fire flaring from her nostrils. Sweat flattened Mortimer’s hair against his forehead and ran down his neck. He believed the mother’s aggression was directed towards him.
“Elk, talk to her, tell her I’ll skewer her little one in here. I will, I swear, no remorse!”
“I’ve told you before . . . they do not have the gift of speech.”
“If she wanted you dead, you already would be,” Gabriella said as she jumped down to the deck beside him.
“How do you know?” Mortimer said.
“Because you are still breathing.”
It was the best explanation she could offer. She did not know how she knew, but she was certain. The wyvern’s eyes did not focus on her, even though Gabriella stood between the dragon and Mortimer. Instead the mother’s gaze was fixed on the egg. Fire spurted out of the creature’s mouth, so hot that Gabriella had to hide her face, but she was certain that the wyvern meant no harm—at least not yet.
“She’s trying to tell us something. Mr. Creedly, let me touch the egg.”
It was cool, like a stone.
Gabriella crossed the port deck, avoiding the hole that had grown larger in recent days. She removed the cooking tripod from stowage and spread its legs on the mid-deck. She then carried the brazier full of unlit coals to port where she balanced it on the railing. The wyvern watched her, and when Gabriella stepped back, the mother hovered over the brazier and blew a quick huff of fire. The coals caught with a flash. Gabriella picked up the brazier before it grew too hot to touch and secured it on the tripod.
“Put the egg in it,” she said to Mortimer.
“Of course!” Adamantus exclaimed, lowering his head for a closer look.
Mortimer turned his back on the wyvern and placed the egg in the fire. Gabriella adjusted it with quick touches, careful not to burn her hands. The coals beneath crunched, and the egg settled. When she checked over her shoulder, the wyvern had already drifted away again.
Now they had to add a new task to their duties: someone always had to tend the fire and watch the egg. This meant even less sleep for Gabriella. She was not the only one who suffered though. After two days, dark circles hung beneath Mortimer’s eyes as well.
Gabriella was alone on the deck on the third night of egg watching. Clear nights were cold nights. Even wrapped in a blanket and a cloak, she was uncomfortable, so she locked the wheel in place and sat down next to the egg to keep warm. She spotted the North Star through a gap in the ratlines and used it as a reference for their course.
It had been a long time since Gabriella had had the opportunity to simply sit, warm herself by a fire, and stare into the coals turning into lacy, white ash. The stone-like egg silhouetted against the flames reminded her of the large, smooth river stones her father would warm on the hearth and slip into their beds in wintertime, beds their mother would make with extra blankets that smelled of the cedar chests that they were stored in during warmer months.
Perhaps it was the thought of home that triggered it, perhaps it was the sight of the moon and stars, but Gabriella found herself singing. It was a melancholy, lilting melody that her grandmarm used to sing on evenings while she snapped beans on the porch and listened to the wind stirring in the trees.
Gabriella never knew the words completely, but she had substituted her own over the years. Her suspicion was that her grandmarm had done the same and her own mother as well, so that with each generation words were renewed while the melody remained constant.
Take me to, the shady cove
Where my love slumbers tonight
Take me to the amber field,
Where love is green and bright
Take me to the empire lost
Where in windows stars shine their light.
Take me to the broken dreams,
Where brothers clashed and fight,
Take me to the shady cove,
Where there is peace tonight.
She stopped. Something alerted her that she was no longer alone. Some sound, a wing beat that was keeping time. She looked over the railing—into the wyvern’s eye.
The dragon had moved alongside the ship, silent as a ghost. The moonlight, the eye, its narrow pupil, its jeweled iris, stared down at Gabriella like a planet. It was like looking into infinity. She could not think before that opening. She knew she should call out and wake the others, but something restrained her. It was less the presence of the mother and more the serenity of the moment. It felt sacrosanct, and she was reluctant to violate it.
Gabriella returned the gaze. There was a quality she read in it that told her there was no malice there. She wondered if the song, ancient and mysterious as it was, had somehow tamed the mother. But she remembered Adamantus’ words: drago
ns could not be tamed. She also knew that she was no mage. Perhaps it was she who had been tamed. Perhaps there was a spell that had been cast upon her. They all had been mesmerized, changed somehow by the presence of this magical, terrible beast. Her existence exerted a pull on them all, like the moon on the tides, whether they admitted it or not. She wished she could return the egg right then. She felt solidarity with the mother. They had everything in common.
“We are not so different, you and I,” Gabriella said softly. The wings continued their slow rhythm. The head turned in response to the sound of her voice. “Both of us are burdened.” Gabriella’s eyes fell to her lap where her hands were clenched. “I sometimes wish he had never been born.”
She shivered. Her words startled her. She wanted to believe they had been said by someone else, but they were her own, as true as the feelings behind them. She squeezed her fists more tightly and looked back into the eye.
Not the gift of speech, but perhaps the gift of understanding, she thought.
The eye blinked slowly, a planet eclipsed. The mother let out a long sigh, hissing through her nostrils, then floated back away from the ship once more.
Even though it was distant now, it was hard to get the eye out of her mind. Limpid, knowing, wise, dreadful. Gabriella knew that it was seared into her mind permanently. Perhaps as an old woman, when all her memories faded, that would be all she would have left: a dragon’s eye, a jewel of infinity.
She looked up to the moon. It was waning gibbous, reflecting bright white light. They were running out of time.
Gabriella thought that after her moment with the mother, they would no longer be enemies. She was wrong. And it was as Adamantus had predicted: calculated and strategic and aimed at what made them all most vulnerable.
Their water.
It was the latest night could be, just before the wheel of the earth began the turn to morning, just before the stars in the east would begin to fade. Mortimer was due to relieve Gabriella, and she had allowed her chin to rest on her arm stretched over the wheel, her eyelids lifting and falling. She had taken for granted that the mother wyvern was far to their stern. She had not bothered to check over her shoulder for more than an hour. So when there was a sudden thud from the bow Gabriella sat up immediately, frightened that she had let the Elawn drift low and they had struck an island.
But the moon traced a white path on the empty sea far below them. There was a second concussion, and she saw one of the water barrels tumbling end over end. This time she saw the arched wings and the heavy black shape of the wyvern, blocking out the stars. She was already retreating. Gabriella screamed out, calling the others. Adamantus, Mortimer, even Dameon rushed, bleary-eyed, out onto the deck.
“She attacked the water barrels!”
Gabriella’s post was at the wheel, near the egg. She pulled Dameon close to her while the wyvern continued to drift from the ship. Mortimer and Adamantus inspected the damage. Cursing, Mortimer fetched a pan and filled it with what he could salvage from the overturned barrels, but the water didn’t reach halfway up the sides of the pot. He seethed, his eyes darting back and forth between Gabriella and the fire resting in the coals.
She was glad when Adamantus came to her even though his news was grim: “She punctured the two remaining barrels with the barb of her tail.”
“Is that all the water?” Gabriella pointed to the precious contents of the pot.
By Mortimer’s silence, she knew the answer was yes. She explained what had happened, that the mother had drifted up beneath the ship and surprised her. She said it had been too dark to see. She did not admit to her earlier moment gazing into the eye of the beast, but she sensed that Adamantus was aware she was holding back something. Mortimer’s anger, at least, was deflected. He cursed the dragon and ran to the stern and waved his sword at her.
“I’ll watch the wheel with Mortimer for a while,” Adamantus said. “You need rest.”
Gabriella went below, taking Dameon with her, but she remained wide awake as the darkness in the windows faded and day was upon them.
Day, with its harsh, drying sun.
They had a council of war later that morning.
“We cannot afford to underestimate her intelligence. She strikes now because it is to her advantage,” Adamantus said.
“She must know there is a long stretch of sea without islands ahead of us,” Gabriella said, retying a halyard once again. Fibers from the rope covered her hands as if she had been petting a shedding cat. The rope itself appeared to have grown thinner in recent days.
“Perhaps, but that was the case long before she struck. The opposite may be true,” the elk said. “There may very well be islands coming up soon, but we must not give into her plan and set foot on them for water, no matter how tempting they are.”
They decided they would continue onward as far as they could before landing. Even Mortimer broke his long, brooding silence—he had not spoken since the wyvern attacked—to express his agreement. Gabriella suspected the trapper did not relish being outsmarted by a beast.
As Adamantus predicted, they passed a number of islands that day. Many were covered by trees changing orange and yellow with the turning of the season. It was the first time they had seen forests since Kejel. Gabriella took the lush forests as a hopeful sign that they were nearing the mainland.
Many of the islands had no shoreline, just trees growing right up to a rocky ledge where waves crashed and spread their spray in the wind. Gabriella saw only one island that had a gravelly beach that might be a good landing place for ships. Gabriella adjusted their course slightly so that they would fly over it.
The beach was in a small cove. A shipwreck sat in the shallow water. It did not appear to have run aground. Like the ships rotting in the harbor of Foyle Island, the boat had simply sunk while at anchor. It had settled on the cove bottom, listing to the side so that the masts leaned at an angle pointing westward. The sails had long since been reduced to tattered scraps waving in the breeze.
“There is someone in the crow’s nest,” Mortimer said.
He was right. The shape of a person leaned across the lookout’s perch. Mortimer pulled a spy glass out of one of the stowage bins. After studying the wreck, he handed the glass to Gabriella. “Take a look.”
With the glass, Gabriella could see the wreck in amazing detail. She could see the boards, the remains of ropes, and the waves swirling about what was left of the cabin. Surf slipped in and out of the windows and doorways. She panned upwards to the crow’s nest and gasped. It was not a person there, but bleached bones wrapped in rags. Not even the entire body was still present—one leg dangled off the side of the nest, its bones below the knee lost to the sea. Only a bit of frayed trouser marked where a leg had once been. On the shore she saw more bodies reduced to a tangle of bones and rags, half sunk in the sand.
They wyvern followed at a great distance, but Gabriella felt her gaze like the heat of the sun. Something had killed those sailors on the shore and something had scared that remaining sailor into the crow’s nest—where he waited and died rather than come down. No one left this island alive. Gabriella turned the wheel and tilted the sails to lift them higher, away from the bones bleaching in the sunlight.
Two more days passed. They limited themselves to a few tablespoons of water per day, barely sufficient to quench their growing thirst. At best, the sips of water relieved their dry mouths, but they were left wanting more. Dameon was insufferable. They had to put the water out of his reach. For good measure, Mortimer carried the remaining water with him at all times. Gabriella, however, suspected the trapper was taking more than his allotment.
They shortened their watches to only two hours. Otherwise it was simply too hard to concentrate. Gabriella no longer slept, but she was always weak and tired so she did not feel awake either. This was the madness coming, the madness that destroyed crews. Thirst and hunger, she had heard, could tear societies apart: villages against villages, neighbors against neighbors, friends agai
nst friends, and finally, brother against brother, children against parents.
Chapter 9
Madness
It was evening, and the ship plunged into purple-blue twilight, its lanterns glowing red-orange along the deck. Dameon was curled in a ball in his room, angry with Gabriella because she had insisted on serving him only his ration of water. She avoided him, sitting alone on the stern, chewing a biscuit slowly. Her tongue was dry as paper, and her lips swollen and cracked.
The boards beside her creaked, and Mortimer half sat, half fell down next to her. They all were dizzy. His back was to the companion ladder, and he faced the wyvern that followed off the Elawn’s stern.
“The elk is watching the course,” he said, his fingers tapping the planking beneath him. Long, white cracks had appeared in the skin of his hands. Gabriella had them too. Finally, as if he had reached some resolution within himself, he cursed and began speaking.
“My father was a whaler. He took our family out in a skiff one afternoon for a picnic on the point. But the tide turned against us, and we were caught by a squall as we tried to make it back into the harbor. The ship capsized. I was inside the cabin, near the door, so I swam first for the surface. But when I broke through to the air, there was no one behind me. My mother, my father, and my brother were trapped in the ship. There was still air inside. I could hear my family pounding to get out. I climbed on top of the ship. I tried pulling the boards loose, but I was too weak. I listened as they pounded and pounded, I was sure my father would be strong enough to burst through the hull. But he wasn’t. The pounding stopped. The ship sank.”
Gabriella sat frozen. She wondered if he had gone mad to share so much. But on second look, he had his eyes closed and sighed as if relieved to speak about something she suspected he had never spoken of to anyone. He pulled his knees close to his chest, as Dameon would when upset. It was a strange pose for a grown man. His hands clasped one another as if somehow he could comfort himself through it.