by Lynn Kurland
“Thank you, good sir.”
He patted her shoulder again with one of his great paws, then walked off, whistling a cheery tune and shoving a few more lads out of his way. Aisling would have watched him go, but she decided immediately that the best thing she could do was hurry to the end of the dock. Whilst Paien of Allerdale might have been of a friendly mien, the rest of the men on the dock were not. If she gained the ship without losing her coin, it would be a miracle.
Unfortunately miracles were apparently not hers to claim that day. By the time she had reached the ship Master Paien had indicated, all the while trying to avoid seedy-looking men and even a pair of women dressed in red silks who looked as dangerous as the men, she was missing not only her coin but her cloak and her boots. She wasn’t entirely sure her eye wouldn’t swell shut soon, and she was fairly convinced her lip was bleeding. Whatever else might be said about her, one could certainly say that brawling was not an occupation she should be considering anytime soon.
Things were just not going her way. She shouldn’t have been surprised, she knew. The journey there had been terrible: uncomfortable, unpleasant, and with absolutely no privacy in the coach. That, added to her constant fear every time they paused that she had been followed and caught, had made for a horrendous journey indeed. She hadn’t spent very much time doing anything but hiding behind the hood of the peddler’s cloak and wishing she could ignore the sensation of the carriage standing still and the world spinning endlessly beneath her…
She stumbled to an ungainly halt behind a stocky man who directed other less burly lads to carry things to a ship bobbing not-so-gently against the wood of the dock.
“Excuse me, sir,” she began.
He elbowed her aside. “No time, lad.”
“Are you Captain Burke?”
“If you have to ask, lad, you should be back at home, hiding behind your mama’s skirts, now move.”
“Paien of Allerdale sent me,” she blurted out.
Captain Burke swung around, almost taking her head off with his arm. He frowned. “Did he, now?”
“He gave me a coin as well,” Aisling said, wrapping her arms around herself.
“Where is it?”
There was the rub, truly. She took a deep breath and looked up at him with as much courage as possible. “I lost it.”
“Had it stolen from you, no doubt,” Captain Burke said with a grunt. “And no wonder, what with you being such a wisp of a thing. What are you thinking to be out in the world?”
“I have no choice,” she said, trying not to sound as desperate as she was. “I must reach Sgioba as quickly as possible.” She took a deep breath. “I could work on your ship.”
“Doing what?” he asked with a snort. “Looking for your beard? Lad, you’re about to find yourself in the bay if you don’t leave me be.”
“I can sew your—” She gestured at the canvas bits hanging from the crossbars of the mast of his ship. “Well, whatever those things are.”
“Sails,” the captain said, blowing out his breath. “You useless landlubber, begone!”
Aisling caught him by the sleeve. “Please,” she said quickly. “Please. I need to get to Sgioba.”
He raised his hand. She realized he intended to strike her only because another hand caught his wrist and stopped it from coming any farther toward her. The captain started to swear, then shut his mouth abruptly around his words. He shook off the restraining hand, then schooled his features.
“Just a lesson in manners,” he said gruffly.
A male voice spoke from behind her, the words pronounced in an elegant way she could understand perfectly. “Not taught by you, I don’t think.”
“Of course, my lord.”
Aisling looked over her shoulder. A man stood there, cloaked and hooded. He was quite a bit taller than she was, though she didn’t consider herself particularly diminutive. Hadn’t the Guildmistress complained endlessly about the space her legs took up in order for her to weave in the workroom?
The man reached out and handed the captain two gold sovereigns.
“That should suffice for his passage and mine,” he said, his voice sounding as hoarse as if he’d been shouting for weeks on end. “And I am no lord.”
“Of course, my l—” The captain bit his tongue around what he obviously intended to say. He shot Aisling a look. “Best polish his boots for him, boy, lest he humors me by allowing me to pitch you over the side.”
Aisling managed to nod, only half heeding what he had said. She was too busy looking at the man’s hand. It was horribly scarred, as if it had been…well, she supposed she couldn’t say in truth what the scars were from. If the scars troubled him, he didn’t show it. He simply tucked his hand back in his sleeve and stood there, silent and unmoving. Aisling looked up at his face but could see nothing of his features save a rather handsomely fashioned nose that protruded slightly from his hood.
“Thank you,” she said, feeling that was somehow woefully inadequate. “I will of course repay you—”
“No need.”
“If he says no need, take him at his word and get your arse on board, lad,” the captain snapped, “before I forget your passage has been paid.”
Aisling didn’t doubt he would if it suited him. She ran up the ramp spanning the distance between the dock and the ship, because she was accustomed to doing what she was told. And because she wasn’t, in truth, free as yet. Until she reached Gobhann and bargained with Scrymgeour Weger for one of his mercenaries to aid her, she was still captive. She knew this because she had earlier found a note tied around a packet of dried fruit. She had subsequently tucked that note very carefully inside the cover of Weger’s book where it would remain hidden. She supposed she could have just as easily thrown it away given that its contents had been indelibly burned onto her mind.
Go to Gobhann, talk to Weger, find a lad capable of doing what needs to be done with absolute secrecy and silence. Say nothing of your errand or your life will be the forfeit, no matter how many fortnights have passed.
All of which she fully intended to do. She would walk up to Weger’s gates, knock, ask to speak to the lord of the keep, then present her problem to him along with a bag of gold—
Which she didn’t have any longer. She shivered as she stood in the midst of the commotion of a ship getting ready to launch. She felt horribly exposed, mostly because she had not a bloody thing to her name save that book of Weger’s strictures she had tucked into the waistband of her trousers for safekeeping. No pack with supplies, no gold, no cloak with more coins sewn into the hem. She didn’t even have her hair to sell any longer. She wondered if it might be easier to simply go and heave herself overboard—
And then she saw past all the ropes and barrels and gear that littered the deck, past the other ships that crowded the one she stood on, past the buildings that had blocked her view of something she had never seen before.
The sea.
She realized her mouth was hanging open only because her mouth had become rather dry after a few minutes standing in the same place, unmoving, practically not breathing.
It was…glorious.
She walked over to the railing, because she couldn’t not go have a closer look. She clutched the wood and looked out into the bay, seeing what she had never before imagined. It moved ceaselessly, that sea, sparkling in the sunlight, continually slipping past the ships bobbing against the docks.
“Shut your mouth,” the captain snapped suddenly, “and try not to look as if you’ve never been away from home before.”
She hadn’t realized he was standing next to her. She looked up at him, mute. He started to say something else, then sighed.
“Never seen it, have you?”
She shook her head slowly.
“You’ll never be free of it now, lad, not with that look on your face.”
“Won’t I?” she managed.
“Nay,” he said in a tone that was suddenly almost kind. “Best find yourself something to do
either on a ship or near the shore. You’ll wither, else.” He put his hand on her shoulder briefly. “We men of the sea require a certain amount of salt air every day or we just waste away.” He nodded wisely. “Keep that in mind—nay, damn it, put those kegs on the port side, ye bloody fools!”
Aisling watched him stride away, continuing to instruct his men politely about their duties. She thought about what he’d said, then looked back out over the sea. She suspected he might be right. She listened to the men and lads shouting as they did whatever it was they did to get the ship underway, heard the gulls crying above her, smelled air that swept through her and healed something inside her she hadn’t realized was a wound.
And then she remembered whom she had to thank for it all.
That man was standing a few paces away from her, his hands—both scarred, she could now see—gripping the railing. The wind caught his hood suddenly and tore it away from his face.
Aisling wasn’t impressionable. In fact, she had almost prided herself on her steely pragmatism and her ability to remain unaffected by most everything. Jewels and silks on display during those rare moments when she had seen fine ladies wearing them during the daylight on their way to some fancy occasion or other had left her unimpressed. Fine carriages, well-bred horses, men dressed and powdered and perfumed had hardly merited a yawn. She might have lifted an eyebrow now and again over something she’d read in a book, but she couldn’t say that counted for anything much.
But that man standing there…
She was, she reminded herself, not a giddy maid. She was a woman of a reasonable number of years, too old to be swayed by a pretty face.
But she wasn’t swayed; she was stunned. She had never in her life seen a man so handsome. She hardly knew where to begin describing him. His hair was dark, his profile noble, his features refined and flawless. The captain had been an absolute fool to call him a lord. Surely only a prince could be so beautiful—
And then he turned to face her.
She continued to stare at him without a change in her expression only because she had mastered that art at an early age to save herself the trouble she had watched less discreet gels find themselves unhappily experiencing.
The left side of his face was horribly scarred, as if he had caught his cheek against some unyielding surface that hadn’t wanted to release him. It wasn’t so much a single scar as it was a web of scars that started at the corner of his mouth, ran up his cheek to the side of his eye, then traveled over to his ear. It looked as if he might have scraped his face against the same bit of rock that had perhaps taken hold of his hands.
She looked into his very green eyes and smiled faintly. “Thank you, good sir, for the passage.”
He pulled his hood back over his face, nodded, then moved away.
“Sew a seam, can you?”
Aisling jumped at the sound of the bark next to her ear. She steadied herself and looked at Captain Burke. “I can, actually.”
“I have a thing or two needing mending. You’ll do it and earn a pair of boots and a cloak if you’re quick and careful.” He scowled. “Paien of Allerdale will owe me.”
Aisling followed the captain, feeling the boat already rocking beneath her feet. It reminded her unhappily of the carriage, only at least here she had air to keep herself from being ill. She didn’t dare ask the captain how long the journey would be. As long as she talked to Weger and convinced him to sell her a mercenary—
Which she would have no way of paying for.
“Coming?” the captain demanded.
She nodded, because she had to have something to put on her feet and around her shoulders. She passed the tall, dark-haired man who had paid for her passage, but he didn’t look at her, and she didn’t attempt further speech with him. One of his hands was resting against the railing, but the other was holding on to the throat of his cloak, as if he didn’t want his hood blowing back and revealing more than it had before.
She understood and hoped he would take her thanks as payment for his generosity. She supposed that in time she would find her feet steady beneath her, grow accustomed to the freedom she would soon be enjoying, and then she would repay the kindness of both Paien of Allerdale and the stranger before her.
But first, her own life, which would be much better seen to with a cloak and boots at her disposal. She followed the captain, hoping sincerely that whatever it was he had for her to sew would be something she and her straight seams could manage.
Three
Rùnach stood at the railing as Burke’s ship limped into port, three days later than intended. That certainly wasn’t the captain’s fault; the weather had been absolutely terrible. If he hadn’t had such a strong stomach, he might have spent his share of time along with the other passengers, heaving his guts out over the railing. Instead, he had simply found a spot above decks where he was out of the way of most of the weather and passed the time contemplating the irony of sailing not to Bere but to Sgioba as a way to ease his sense of haste. Given how much time the weather had cost them, it would have been quicker to simply sail to Bere, then cross the rest of the island on foot.
He supposed he could have avoided the whole thing by flying from Lake Cladach, but he had purposely avoided that. He had left his grandfather’s house on his own two feet, because he had wanted to make a point of leaving behind in a very pedestrian fashion all things magical and beautiful. He had no intention of discontinuing the practice now.
Iteach had walked along behind him obediently for a goodly part of that first night, stood guard over him whilst he slept, then apparently grown bored with it all. Rùnach had lost count of the shapes the beast had taken as he himself had simply continued on his way.
He had paused just outside Istaur and waited until his horse had resumed his own shape and was paying him a decent bit of attention so he could come to some sort of understanding with him. He had made it clear that he would continue on toward Gobhann via ship and his horse would, well, his horse would do as he bloody well pleased, apparently. Iteach had tossed his head at the suggestion that he change himself into something that might fit into a pocket, replaced his equine self with a remarkably fine-looking hummingbird, then flitted off. Rùnach had honestly had no idea whether or not he would ever see him again.
He watched idly as seagulls flapped lazily alongside the ship as it slowed, wondering what it would feel like to fly again. He could remember with perfect clarity the last time he’d flown. It had been with his brother, Gille—a notoriously inventive shapechanger—and their flight against the canopy of heaven had lasted well into the wee hours of the morning. He remembered thinking at the time that that sort of flight might not happen again for a bit. It was a sad testament to his arrogance that it had never occurred to him that that flight might not happen again ever.
“Excuse me, sir,” a young voice warbled beside him, “but there is a bird sitting on your larboard side.”
Rùnach looked to his left and was greeted by the sight of a smirking seagull. He lifted an eyebrow at it and had an ear-piercing call as his reward.
“Lianaich preserve us,” the lad breathed.
Rùnach blinked. “Who?”
“Lianaich,” the lad said, looking at Rùnach as if he had grave doubts about his intelligence. “Guardian of all honest sailors. She was the daughter of Seòladair, the great sea captain who sailed into the mists of Guasachdach with only three half-mad lads as crew. During her father’s greatest voyage around the world, he fell ill, went fully mad before he perished, and it was left to Lianaich to squelch a mutiny and bring back the treasures due the king of Meith, else she would be turned into a mast.”
Rùnach knew several of the descendants of that particular king of Meith, but couldn’t bring to mind a one of them who would have turned a sea captain—or his daughter—into a mast. But perhaps he wasn’t as well-read as the average galley lad.
The lad made a shooing motion at the seagull, but it only squawked at him, which left him backing away, m
aking signs Rùnach assumed were of ward and other seafaring usefulness. He would have assured the boy that it was only his horse masquerading as a rather obnoxious bird, but he was interrupted by the boatswain calling the hands to their stations. The kitchen lad disappeared belowdecks, leaving Rùnach to his watching.
The port of Sgioba was every bit as squalid as he’d expected it might be. There was a certain amount of wear one might expect to see in a port, but this went far beyond simple sea air. He had no fear for himself, but he certainly wouldn’t have brought his sister to such a place.
Then again, for all he knew Mhorghain had traveled here more than once when he’d been unaware she was even alive. He found himself rather more grateful than usual that she had someone now to look after her, though perhaps she would do just as much looking after her husband as he would her.
He looked about himself for the tall, painfully thin lad he’d paid passage for, but didn’t see him. Now, that was a lad who would have been better off to stay at home. Perhaps he’d found sense and was hiding behind a barrel until he could rush down the gangplank and hie himself off to whatever relative he was seeking, hopefully without finding himself robbed yet again.
“Do you have dreams, my lord?”
Rùnach almost fell over the railing. He pulled himself back to himself and found Captain Burke standing next to him, watching him closely.
“What?” he managed.
The captain leaned against the railing with the ease of one who had done it innumerable times and knew just how comfortable he could get before he fell overboard. “I wouldn’t say this to just anyone, but I have the feeling you’ll understand.” He hesitated, then shook his head. “My dreams are troubled.”
Rùnach suppressed the urge to swear. Did he have the sort of face that led people to divulge details better left undivulged? He had gone out of his way to keep to himself and keep his face covered, lest he draw unwanted attention. Apparently he hadn’t been diligent enough.