The Quest to the Uncharted Lands

by Jaleigh Johnson

  It seemed to work. Cyrus stuffed the apple into his mouth, devouring it in quick chomps. With another pang of guilt, Stella wondered how long it had been since he’d last eaten.

  They shared the food in silence for a few minutes while Stella tried to decide what to say to him. She was still coming to grips with the fact that he was from the uncharted lands, a part of Solace that was completely unknown. She had so many questions bubbling up inside her. What was it like where he lived? Was his home in a city or out in the wilderness? How big were the uncharted lands? Was everyone there human, like she and Cyrus, or were there sarnuns and chamelins too? It was impossible to decide what to ask first. Luckily, Cyrus saved her by speaking first.

  “You didn’t turn me in,” he said. It sounded like a question.

  Stella shook her head. “I put on the suit,” she said, hoping that would explain things.

  He’d been about to take another apple slice off the plate, but his hand froze midair. “You did?”

  “The invisibility effect is astonishing.” She took another apple slice and then slid the plate over to him to encourage him to eat more. “Is the material in the suit…magical?” She didn’t know if that was the right word, but she couldn’t think of another way to describe the mysterious substance that powered the garment.

  “You could call it that,” Cyrus said. “The suit is made of a material called aletheum. As far as I know, the substance doesn’t exist in your part of Solace, so I guess it would seem like magic to you. Even we don’t fully understand all the things it’s capable of.”

  Magic. Stella’s scalp prickled, and more questions crowded her mind. She could have asked dozens just about aletheum. An entirely new material. Was it metal? Cloth? A hybrid? What else was it used for?

  Cyrus popped another wedge of cheese in his mouth, speaking around it. “Does this mean you believe me?” he asked.

  Stella dragged herself out of her thoughts, met his eyes, and then looked at the floor. “Yes, I believe you,” she said. “And I’m sorry I used the knockout powder on you.”

  He nodded, a look of relief softening his face. “I didn’t give you much choice,” he admitted, and Stella thought she heard a smile in his voice. “I’m impressed, actually. Not many people can catch me off guard like that.”

  Stella took the last apple slice off the plate, but she stopped before taking a bite. “Do you hear that?” she asked.

  A high, keening whistle echoed from beyond the ship’s walls. At first, Stella thought it was the wind, but then the sound changed, coming in short, quick bursts like pistol shots.

  “It sounds like it’s coming from the main deck,” Cyrus said, standing and cocking his head to listen. “Maybe the crew is signaling someone to—”

  “Wait,” Stella said, holding up a hand to quiet him. “I think there’s something else out there.”

  The whistling abruptly cut off, and now the air beyond the ship’s walls was filled with the sound of furious wingbeats, like a swarm of locusts bearing down on them. Stella ran to the row of crates nearest the windows and shoved one of them flush against the wall. Climbing on top, she stood up so she could see what was happening outside. Cyrus scrambled up beside her.

  “Oh, that can’t be good,” Stella said, her breath fogging the glass.

  In the distance, a flock of birds arrowed straight toward the Iron Glory. Their bodies were the same pale silver as the moon, lighting up the darkness like frightful beacons. There must have been hundreds of them, each the size of a red-tailed hawk. As they got closer, though, Stella could see that their bodies were nothing at all like a hawk’s. They were shaped more like fish, scaled, silver and wriggling, with membranous wings that tore through the air and brought the flock even with the ship.

  “What are they?” Cyrus said, pressing his face to the glass, straining to see as the birds flew past the window.

  “Nightcallers,” Stella said. “They nest in the mountains and glow like they’re filled with moonlight. Most times they fly at night, but I’ve never seen so many at once before. They’re drawn to high-pitched sounds and bright colors because they mimic the colors and calls of the smaller birds they prey on. It puts them in a frenzy.”

  “So that whistle we heard—”

  “Was like a dinner bell,” Stella said. “Watch out!”

  The birds were coming faster now, slamming against the hull of the ship, but one of them aimed straight for their window.

  “Get down!” Stella jerked Cyrus to his knees as it punched right through the window, showering them with shards of glass.

  Stella looked up in time to see the bird careening wildly around the cargo bay before it smashed into a crate and fell to the floor.

  Jumping down, Stella ran to where it lay. The bird was stunned but clearly not dead. It flopped on its belly, wings spread crookedly across the floor.

  “Careful,” Cyrus said, coming up beside her. “Wow, those things are strong.”

  “And dangerous,” Stella confirmed. She pointed to the thing’s scaled body. “Their scales are like sandpaper or sharkskin. You can cut yourself handling them.”

  “Give me a second.” Cyrus ran back to their hideout and emerged a moment later with one of his spare shirts. He tossed it over the stunned bird to quiet it, then carefully picked it up off the floor.

  They went back to the window, and Stella carefully swept the glass off the top of the crate. She held the bird beneath the shirt while Cyrus climbed up. Then she handed the bird to him so he could release it safely out the broken window.

  Stella climbed up beside Cyrus just in time to see the bird dip and corkscrew through the air before rejoining its flock, which was now soaring up, higher above the ship.

  Circling the Iron Glory’s gasbag.

  “No!” Stella cried. Grabbing Cyrus’s spare shirt, she punched out the remaining chunks of glass so she could lean out the window into the cold night wind, trying to get a glimpse of the gasbag.

  “Careful!” Cyrus yanked her back inside. “Those things are still swarming.”

  “But their beaks are even sharper than their bodies!” Stella shrugged off his arm. “They’ll tear up the gasbag in minutes if we don’t get them away from the ship!”

  She jumped off the crate and ran to get her alchemy case. Rummaging through it, she found her matches and a pair of small green cubes, which she stuffed into her trouser pockets. When she rejoined Cyrus, he was batting more of the birds away from the broken window, cursing as their scales sliced a long cut on his hand.

  “Are you all right?” Stella looked at the gash, but it wasn’t deep. She could help him bandage it later. “I’m going out there,” she told him.

  “What?” Cyrus grabbed her arm. “Are you crazy?”

  “There’s a ladder attached to the side of the ship, about two feet away from the window,” Stella said, leaning out to show him. “I just need to get their attention, draw them away from the ship before they puncture the gasbag.”

  “Stella, the gasbag will be fine,” Cyrus said, refusing to let go of her arm. “I told you I helped build this ship, remember? Well, I put some of the aletheum—the same material in the invisibility suit—into the ship’s gasbag to strengthen it. The birds won’t be able to peck through it.”

  “So you say, but have you ever seen a flock of nightcallers on the hunt?” Stella demanded, waving her arm out the window at the zigzagging birds.

  Cyrus clenched his jaw. “No, but I—”

  “Cyrus, my parents are on board this ship,” Stella said, jerking free of his grasp.

  That got his attention. Cyrus went very still. “I didn’t know that,” he said, his voice dropping.

  A wind gust from the broken window blew Stella’s hair around her face. She raked it back, reached in her pocket with her other hand, and pulled out the cubes. Fuses curled from their centers like cherry stems. “I didn’t just stow away on the Iron Glory for the fun of it,” she said. “I knew the expedition would be dangerous, but if I can hel
p keep them safe, I’ll do whatever it takes.”

  She climbed up onto the window ledge, and this time Cyrus didn’t try to stop her. Bracing herself against the frame, and careful to avoid any more of the jagged glass shards, Stella leaned out into the darkness, wind, and screeching nightcallers.

  Stella tried not to look down, but her eyes were irresistibly drawn to the yawning darkness spread out below her. Even with the aid of the moonlight and the dizzying glow of the flocking birds, she couldn’t see all the way to the ground. Wisps of cloud drifted around the Iron Glory’s hull, and a freezing wind went deep into her lungs with every breath she took.

  You’re not going to fall, she told herself, though she knew it might turn out to be a lie.

  “Cyrus,” she called back through the window without turning around.

  “I’m here.” She felt his hand at her waist, bracing her against another wind gust. “Can you reach the ladder?”

  “Yes,” Stella said. The metal ladder was directly to her right, but at that moment, it seemed like it was a mile away. “Keep swatting the birds away if you can, but protect your hands.”

  Before she could change her mind, Stella flung out a hand and grabbed the closest ladder rung. The metal bar was freezing, and Stella wasn’t wearing gloves. Not a good plan, but she wasn’t backing down now. Leaning forward, she stepped off the window ledge and hauled herself onto the ladder.

  Out in the open air, away from the protective heat of the cargo bay, she got very cold very quickly. Stella’s whole body trembled and her teeth chattered. Nightcallers screeched in her ear, circling her head and skipping off the metal skin of the hull. Tightening her grip on the ladder, Stella forced herself to look up, not down, and began to climb.

  The main deck was at least forty feet above her, but Stella didn’t need to go all the way up there. For one thing, any crew members brave or stupid enough to be out on deck among the birds might see her, and for another, the closer she got to the heart of the flock, the more likely it was that they’d knock her off the ladder and the ship altogether.

  She just needed to climb high enough to attract the flock’s attention, and she couldn’t do that hanging out the window below. The birds responded to high-pitched sounds, but they were also drawn to bright light, and luckily, Stella had something that could produce both.

  The ladder creaked below her, drawing Stella’s attention away from the nightcallers.

  It was Cyrus. He’d climbed out the window and was coming up the ladder behind her.

  “What are you doing?” Stella yelled, to be heard above the howling wind. “Get back inside!”

  “I can’t let you risk your neck out here alone!” Cyrus said, pulling himself up. “Besides, this ship is my only ticket home. I’m not letting it crash.” He had his spare shirt balled up in his fist and used it to swat a nightcaller away from Stella’s leg.

  Stella didn’t have time to argue with him. She kept climbing until she was about twenty feet up from the broken window. The nightcallers were so thick around her now she could barely see. She didn’t think she could risk going any higher.

  Hooking an arm around the ladder rung, Stella reached into her pocket and pulled out the matches and one of the cubes. Getting the match lit in this wind was going to be a challenge.

  “Come up next to me,” Stella called down to Cyrus, scooting over on the ladder to make room. When he was even with her, she held up the match, prepared to strike it against the ship’s metal skin. “Once I get the fuse lit, it’ll go off like a firework. I’ll hold it as long as I can, then throw it and hope the nightcallers will see it and forget all about the gasbag.”

  Cyrus shook his head. “They’ll swarm you,” he said. “Let me do it. I can give you light without the fireworks.” He waved his hand for emphasis.

  Stella scowled at him. “And have you pass out and fall off the ship to your death? I don’t think so. This’ll work. Trust me.”

  Without waiting for him to agree, Stella struck the match, huddling over it to protect the flame. It took her several tries, but finally, the flame caught and held long enough for her to light the fuse.

  “Watch out!” Stella warned Cyrus as she raised the cube above her head.

  The fuse burned down, and the top of the cube hissed and spat a shower of red sparks that lit up the sky. Stella turned her face away as they spewed upward in a flaming tower that climbed higher and higher.

  “It’s working!” Cyrus cried. “Here they come!”

  Stella risked a glance up at the gasbag and saw he was right. The nightcallers were gathering, spiraling down from the Iron Glory’s gasbag toward the light and hissing sparks at them.

  Closer…

  And closer…until finally there was nothing but a sea of sleek bellies filling her view.

  Stella hurled the cube as far out into the night as she could. A second later, it exploded, shooting off a dozen tiny red fireballs that spun away in all different directions, filling the air with a high-pitched shriek as they streaked away into the darkness.

  The nightcallers, unable to resist the spectacle, twisted and dove after them, following the fireballs away into the night. Stella didn’t even need to use the other cube. She stuffed her matches back into her pocket, and she and Cyrus climbed back down to the broken window.

  When they were safely inside the cargo bay, Stella surveyed the damage. Thankfully, no more of the birds had gotten into the bay, but there was broken glass everywhere.

  “We can’t even sweep it up or the crew will know someone’s here,” Cyrus said. When Stella didn’t reply, he added, “I got a good look at the gasbag while you had your light show going, and I didn’t see any damage. As long as we don’t attract a flock that big again, we should be fine.”

  Stella nodded absently. She was staring up at the broken window, lost in thought.

  “What is it?” Cyrus asked, his boots crunching on glass as he came to stand beside her. “What’s wrong?”

  “I was just thinking, whoever blew that whistle, or whatever it was, had to have seen the size of that nightcaller flock,” Stella said. “They would have known it would draw them in.”

  Cyrus shrugged. “Maybe it was one of the security officers, or one of the deckhands who didn’t know what they were.”

  Stella wasn’t satisfied. “That’s just it—they’re trained to know. The crew has been training for months. You don’t make mistakes like that on an expedition like this. And the whistle itself—those short bursts—almost as if…” She couldn’t finish the thought. It didn’t make sense.

  Cyrus said it for her. “You think whoever it was might have been calling in the birds on purpose?”

  “I don’t know,” Stella said. “I hope not, but…”

  She finished the thought in her head. But not everyone in the Merrow Kingdom or the Dragonfly territories wants the mission to succeed. Not long ago, she’d even accused Cyrus of being a threat to the ship.

  Maybe they actually hadn’t found the real threat yet.

  Stella shook those dark thoughts away. They had no proof, and Cyrus was probably right. It’d probably just been a deckhand who got careless and didn’t know what he was doing. She was tired and cold and letting her worry get to her.

  As they made their way back to their hideout, Stella tried to change the subject. “You said this ship was your only way home, but how did you get stranded here?” she asked. “You told me you couldn’t go back with your expedition, but you didn’t say why.”

  “You’re right. I didn’t,” Cyrus said abruptly. He wouldn’t meet her eyes as they squeezed back behind the crates, where Stella’s candles were barely burning, swimming in wax. “Just like you didn’t say why you stowed away until now. So you’re here to protect your parents?”

  He’d dodged her question, but Stella let it pass. “They’re all that matters,” she said. She reached into her alchemy case for a bandage and handed it to Cyrus for the cut the nightcaller had given him. “My whole life, I’ve lived in
one tiny corner of the world, and that was enough,” she went on. “I had my parents, my books, and my alchemy experiments. I didn’t have much time for anything else—for friends or for dreaming of visiting other places. I didn’t think I needed to.

  “But then I saw the Iron Glory fly,” Stella said, her voice dropping. “It made so many more things seem possible, and the world just seemed to get bigger overnight. Then suddenly, my parents were leaving to be part of that world, and it felt like a piece of me had been torn out. What if something happened and they never came back? It probably doesn’t make any sense, but…” She faltered. How could she expect him to understand what she felt? They barely knew each other.

  But Cyrus smiled, and there was no teasing in it, only a hint of sadness. “It makes sense to me,” he said. “I’m an explorer too, remember? We’re just coming from different directions, meeting in the middle.”

  She hadn’t thought of it like that, but he was right. No matter what secrets Cyrus kept, they had this in common. They were explorers. “I meant what I said, though,” she went on. “I’ll do whatever it takes to protect my parents. If there’s really a terrible storm out there—”

  “There is,” Cyrus interrupted, his face solemn. “And I promise I can guide us through it. As long as no one gets in my way, I can protect the ship.”

  “I won’t get in your way,” Stella said. “In fact, I’m going to help you.”

  His eyes widened, but then he shook his head. “Not a good idea. I work better on my own.”

  Stella didn’t believe that for a second. “You said so yourself: when you use your power, you have to shut out the world and sometimes pass out. It means you’re vulnerable. I can watch over you during that time.”

  He held up a hand, and that annoying grin was back on his face, the one that made Stella want to toss him overboard. “All right, I admit, as an alchemist, you’ve got a special set of skills and tricks,” he said. “Plus you can handle yourself.”

  Stella snorted. Handle him was more like it.

  “And you were incredibly brave out on that ladder,” Cyrus continued. “But this storm is something you’ve never dealt with before. You’ll just end up making things more difficult for me.”