Fireborn Champion

by AB Bradley

  Rank wisps of bitter root and stale water accosted his nostrils. Iron grimaced, and his stomach gurgled.

  “Just take it,” Sander said with an eye roll. “Sailors call what you have squid belly because it feels like that’s what your stomach’s full of. Take this brew to kill the squids and keep your stomach settled. Can’t have you trotting around Urum on an empty stomach, can we?”

  Iron pinched his nose and gulped the liquid. It washed in a warm wave through his stomach, and the knots untied. A smile crept across his face as he considered the empty cup. “What was that?”

  “Just a little tonic recipe I picked up from Thyra a long time ago. Would you like dinner? Ayska invited us to eat with her and the crew. It might be a good chance to get to know them, maybe even ferret out some of the truths from the lies about why they really sail these seas.”

  “So you don’t trust her even after she kept us secret from Caspran?”

  Sander visibly shuddered at the name. “She scored a few points, that’s for sure. Do I trust her? Not yet. We’ve been gone too long from the world. We’re both little children wandering a battlefield. It’s not a good feeling to have. Still, we’ll need allies if we’re to survive. Perhaps these people will turn out to be them. You and I both heard the things she said. The way she spoke about the Serpent Sun—they were mighty convincing if they fooled an alp. I’m not sure yet if that makes her an exceptional liar or us exceptional fools. Maybe both.”

  They headed downstairs to the main deck. The seas calmed as the night deepened, and the Scarlet Widowmaker’s wild rocking calmed to a gentle sway. Wind played with the sails, giving them their own flapping, rippling waves. Oil lamps affixed to the masts cast gold over a long table placed on deck. Six chairs lined each of its long sides with a single chair at the head.

  The crew filled the table, save for the head seat and the two seats beside it. Iron supposed he’d been too busy with his own nausea to notice them set this table for dinner. During the day, the crew was little more than annoying background noise. Now, they sat quietly and whispered to one another, their glares flicking to the strangers joining them for dinner.

  A new kind of fear blossomed in Iron as he met their stares. They were dark eyes, eyes that glittered with suspicion. Every man and woman at the table bore a litany of scars like Ayska’s. Life had peeled these men and women apart and stitched them back together into something harder. He didn’t belong there, sitting in a place of honor without a single scar to show for it.

  Sander nudged him to the table, and they took a seat across from one another. The man with an X scarred over his face sat next to Iron. What was his name? Vigal, Ayska called him. Vigal’s fierce eyes washed up and down Iron. The man rested his arms on the table. One hand held a rough fork. The other held a knife made for cutting. It had probably cut more things than Vigal’s meals in its time.

  “Get yer sea legs, lad?” the sailor asked, arching a brow. The scars on his face warped in an odd way, and his blue eye bulged.

  Iron smiled with his lips closed and nodded. “I did.” He took a breath—and a chance. “Thank you for helping us.”

  The sailor snorted. “Cap’n tells me you hid right well from Caspran. Says you’re men ‘o the Slippery Sinner. That true?”

  “It is. We serve him. I’ve heard that’s rare these days.”

  “There’s good reason it’s rare. You know he died, right? Dead as my poor mum, he is. Shame that.”

  “The Godfall.” Iron finally looked straight at the man, hands pressed against his lap. “You can’t kill gods, though. The Six are immortal.”

  “The titans thought they could. So did the alp. Maybe it took a man to finally do it. They say Sol sits on a throne on the Mother’s head. If that’s not a sign a god’s dead, I don’t know what is.” Vigal leaned back in his seat and folded his hands behind his head. He looked into the stars and smirked. “Ain’t no one seen magic in years. That’s how you know they died. Either that, or they got scared and abandoned us mortal folk. Either way, they don’t give a spit about Urum anymore.”

  “That’s not true. They care about every living creature. They are the true gods of Urum.”

  “Priests, hah! Ayska shoulda’ listened to us. You’ll have us back in chains or worse if you stay on the Widowmaker more than a night or two. We’ve got half a mind to stuff you two in a barrel and send you to the sea. We’ve got a more important mission than ferrying fools hunted by the king and his hound.”

  The woman across form Vigal shushed the man with an angry glare. She had a combative look about her and the deepest laugh lines Iron had ever seen—not that he’d seen that many. She wore her straw blond hair in a tight bun and bore bare shoulders textured by glyph scars.

  Vigal quieted, blushing. “Sorry, Fiolle.”

  Iron traded glances with Sander. They waited under the stars and flapping sails until the freshly-repaired door leading below deck swung open and out stepped Ayska Masrari.

  She moved quiet as a wraith to the main deck and took her seat at the head of the table. “She’s asleep, thank the gods. Today’s been hard for her.”

  “It’s been hard for all of us,” Vigal said.

  “It has. Now eat and drink, you cursed sailors!” Ayska raised an oversized mug spotted with rust, the crew did the same, and the quiet that pervaded the ship clattered to the deck under the weight of the crew’s laughter.

  Sander swiped his mug and took a sip. His eyes widened as he smacked his lips. “Whoa there. Saltwater gin? Haven’t had that in years.” He coughed and tapped his chest with a fist. “Not that I’m complaining.”

  Iron raised his cup, but Sander yanked it from him. “Unless you want to find yourself doubled over the railing, I suggest you save the gin for another day.”

  With a longing look at the drink now in Sander’s hands, Iron leaned back in his chair. Captain Ayska eyed him with a little grin tugging on her lip. She pulled her thick braids behind her and leaned forward, sipping the gin in her mug. Its pungent aroma reeked of pine and spice as her breath carried it into the open. “You two hid very well from Caspran. How’d you manage to stay out of sight so long?”

  “We had a helpful distraction,” Iron said. “We’re Sinner’s men. Shadows are our thing.”

  “It wasn’t magic then?”

  “Mostly potatoes and rice.” He rested his arms on the table and leaned closer to her. “Is magic really that rare these days? There are no priests who use the power of the gods?”

  Ayska smirked and took another sip. “No, I don’t guess there are, or if they do, they’re being a bunch of fucking cowards and hiding while the rest of the world suffers under the king and his serpents.”

  Iron chuckled and leaned away. He hoped it looked natural enough.

  “So tell me a little more about yourselves. What brings Iron and Sander to Ormhild, then so quickly forces them from its shores?”

  “That’s funny, I was about to ask you how a Rabwian ship captain came all the way to Skaard and just happened to start eavesdropping on our conversation while holding the answer to all our problems.”

  She cocked her head and pressed her hand against her chest, mockingly surprised. “Why, it’s all pure coincidence. Maybe the Six led me there.”

  “Not likely.”

  “You’re right, it’s not. You heard what I said when I killed Elof. That’s why we sail the seas. That’s why we go port to port. We’ve got names on a list, and we won’t stop until we’ve crossed every single one of those slavers who clapped us in chains off it.”

  A quest for vengeance against slavers didn’t feel right to him. He didn’t want to spend his years of freedom leaving a trail of bodies in his wake. “Where are you taking us?” Iron looked to Sander. “Has she told you?”

  “Nope.” Red colored Sander’s cheeks, and his eyes had a glassy sheen. The man was probably exhausted from pulling Iron through snow drifts and running through Ormhild. He was thirsty at least, judging by the swigs he kept taking of that
odd gin.

  “You keep asking about us, but I don’t know anything about you. I don’t even know where we’re going.”

  “We’re going where I want us to go. I’m captain!” She raised her cup, and the other sailors did the same. They all had those glassy eyes and cherry cheeks. Iron didn’t like it. Not because he didn’t like the crew—Well, maybe he didn’t actually like them, but they didn’t know that. No, he didn’t like it because even Sander joined in on their fun and Iron couldn’t. He sat at the table, but he couldn’t be farther from it.

  The woman in the blond bun gave Iron a dour look. “Aw, the little guy’s in a sour mood. You not enjoying yourself, Sinner’s man?”

  Another sailor, the portly man with stubby fingers and a soft belly that nearly spilled onto the table, turned to Iron and raised his glass. “No gin fer him! Poor thing’ll be tossing his guts out to the water gods. His silky stomach ain’t ready for none o’ the sailor’s saltwater, isn’t that right, priest boy?”

  A third man joined in on the fun, all joints and bone draped by skin cracked and leathered. He wore a cap that came to the bridge of his beak of a nose. Wisps of hair curled from beneath his hat’s hem, fluttering in the wind. “Gil, don’t be so hard on the boy.”

  At least one of them had an ounce of kindness left in them. Maybe the night wouldn’t be so bad.

  “Get the cook,” the lanky one continued, waving his cup at Gil. “Maybe he can warm some milk!”

  The table burst into laughter as Gil guffawed, clanking his cup against the man’s. “Good one, Thip, but you are the cook!”

  Even Sander stifled a chuckle, although the glassy sheen in his eyes had turned to more of a glacial wall. A surging ball of anger and rage welled in Iron. It took all his strength not to leap from the table and dive into the waters. At least the monsters of the deep wouldn’t make his life so torturous. Maybe he could even swim back to Skaard. The cabin might still stand. He could live there.

  A fire lit inside him. It washed away the mockery, the laughter, the dark eyes and dark hearts. One simple spell, and he could shut them all up. One simple spell, and they’d know not to mock him. He could do it. He could put them all in their place.

  Except he couldn’t cast one thanks to his oath, and if he left, Sander would never release him from it. Iron would live and die knowing he held a god’s power within him but could never use it because he ran away when he should have stayed and fought.

  Iron looked to Sander and clenched his fists. The Sinner’s magic welled inside him, hotter than usual. It begged for freedom from behind the chains holding it at bay.

  As the Sinner slips me from death’s grasp, so shall I swear to keep my word. Dammit.

  His words echoed in his thoughts, and his fists relaxed. He could not break the sacred vow. This world wanted darkness. This world begged for despair. So many souls had fallen. Hells, everyone thought the Six dead. No wonder kindness fled the people of Urum. It probably died with the wounds that caused the scars the crew bore.

  The circle is broken. If he wanted to fix it, he must stand above them.

  Iron glanced up, to a crowd still in the throws of laughter. If they weren’t looking at him directly, they flicked their stares sidelong at him.

  A wide, toothy grin pulled his cheeks high. Laughter bellowed in his now open-mouthed grin. He lurched over the table and swiped his cup from Sander, coming to his feet. The man tried to stop Iron, but his master couldn’t find his balance even on calm waters.

  Ayska reached for him with a sigh. “Iron, don’t—”

  “To the captain and her crew! May the Sinner bless them with quick fingers and lustful hearts!” Iron threw his chin back and put the cup to his lips. Pine and spices stampeded his nostrils. He poured the gin down his throat.

  The liquid hit his tongue like acid, and tears rolled down his cheeks. Still, he swallowed the noxious drink even though it went down like molten rock. His stomach was a baker’s oven, but he wouldn’t put the drink down until not a single drop of saltwater gin remained.

  The last bead hit his lips with a biting sting. Iron slammed the cup onto the table. He wiped spit and gin from the corners of his lips and kicked his chair forward, turning from the crew. Laughter died as he strolled upstairs toward the stern. He didn’t so much as look back. He stared forward, rounding the captain’s cabin. He came to his familiar spot and collapsed, pressing his head onto the worn railing.

  Snot dribbled from his nose. His stomach burbled and sloshed. He’d see the gin again any second. While he waited, he thought about the time he rode the thundersnow and how spreading his arms to the chaos and flying above the world had freed him from it.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Loyal Stance

  Iron’s world slowly gained clarity and revealed a blanched sky and sigh of waves against hewn timbers. He stared between two railings at the low, pale clouds rolling to the horizon. They drifted toward that long and mysterious line like an endless field of waves flipped on their backs. They choked the sunlight, but weren’t the kind to carry rain, just melancholy.

  Foaming white capped the waves rippling the sea’s glassy tabletop, but unlike his time just beyond Skaard’s dark shores, these waves didn’t browbeat the ship. Thank the Sinner, they were of a nicer breed.

  Iron’s heartbeat pounded against his temples, or maybe his brain had swollen so much from the saltwater gin it decided to self-evict from its fool of a landlord. He squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath. His cheek luxuriated in a pool of his drool that left a sticky residue as he wiped it from his lips.

  Sander snored in obnoxious, broken trumpets on a nearby crate. His chin pointed to the sky, and his wide mouth threatened to catch anything a mischievous gull might deposit in it. The cup brimming with gin the night before hung on the hook of his finger and twisted with the gentle up and down rocking of the ship.

  Iron flexed his eyelids while he shielded his eyes against a diffuse sun that added unwanted spice to his headache. He pinched his temples and sat upright. A flagon at his side gurgled as his hand pressed into the bladder. Iron uncorked the drink and sniffed. The odorless scent betrayed the water inside. He tipped the flagon back and guzzled greedily. The cool liquid rolled down his throat and filled his belly, calming the echo of fire from that vile gin. At least his master had the foresight to grab his apprentice water before passing out.

  “They’re not as bad as they seem,” Ayska said.

  Iron’s veins constricted, and he spewed a mouthful of water against the railing. He whipped around to find Ayska reclining on a case paled by sunlight and fastened with fraying ropes. The arrow of her pink tongue passed over her lips as she leaned on her elbows and flicked a dagger in her hand. Iron swallowed, his eyes fixed on the blade.

  The captain smirked and started using the weapon’s tip to clean her nails. He scooted back against the railing and watched her work. Cursed woman. She toyed with him like a snow leopard toys with a field rat with nowhere to go.

  Iron crossed his arms and raised his chin. “Come here to gloat at my expense? I drank the gin and shared your meal. I took your crew’s barbs and with a smile to boot.”

  “They only did that because they like you. They were testing you.”

  “Testing me? You people are insane.”

  Ayska chortled and flipped one of her thick braids behind her shoulder. Even in the overcast skies, her hair glimmered like she’d dusted it with diamonds. “That’s truer than you know. Yeah, they were testing you to see how you’d react. My crew trusts me, but they had to see for themselves what kind of man you are. Good news is you passed the test. They’ll let you stay.”

  “Let me?” Iron’s brows pinched together. “And if I hadn’t passed their little test you would’ve thrown us overboard?”

  “Either that or seen how you liked the taste of steel. Life on the sea isn’t a walk through fresh snows, and our mission dictates we only allow certain guests an extended stay aboard the ship.”

  Iron had
to smile. He pressed the heel of his palm against his brow and shook. “Insane. Totally insane. This mission of yours…” His eyes flicked to her slave brands. Should he press the conversation? Fuck it. “Names on a list, you said. They were the ones who enslaved you. Elof enslaved that, ah, Thip fellow? And so you killed Elof for what he’d done to a free man.”

  “Many free men, women and children. So, a strange boy from the wilds of Skaard named after metal does knows the flesh trade.”

  “You know where I’m from?”

  She motioned toward Sander. “His tongue flapped like a flag in a typhoon after a few swigs of gin. Mine probably would’ve too if I’d been without a good drink so many winters. And in Skaard of all places. That’s all they do is drink there. That’s the only thing to do in that wasteland. He told me all about you, Iron.”

  Iron’s teeth clamped together. Sander made him take a Sinner’s Oath, but a few drops of gin and his master was ready to tattoo his face with every secret he’d ever heard.

  Ayska still had a playful gleam in her eyes. Iron flashed a wooden smile and cocked his head. “Oh, he did, did he? Why don’t you tell me what he told you, and I’ll let you know if it was truth or the ranting of a senile hermit with a little girl’s liver.”

  A silvery giggle spilled from her lips. “You’re not as ignorant as you look. I guess for now, you’ll still be shrouded in mystery to me. Careful though, I tend to get what I want.”

  “I promise we have nothing to give you.”

  “Everyone has something of value.” She pulled Caspran’s coin from her bosom and flipped it, catching it in her open palm. “It’s not always gold. I know you’ve got some kind of treasure, and I’m certain the Loyal Father brought you to me for a reason. The gods always have good reasons for the gifts they give us.”

  Iron looked Ayska straight in her eyes. “So this test was all about trust. You’re here trying to trick secrets from me so you probably still don’t really trust my master and I. But why should we trust you? We’re your captives on this ship, heading gods only know where on a sea I’ve never sailed. You could be carting us to Eloia for the king and we’d never know until too late.”