A Wind in the Night

by Barb Hendee

  “Hide it?” she questioned.

  “Or it will be stolen halfway through the journey. Some making their first voyage on this ship are unprepared. Fights—and even some deaths—have occurred.”

  She cringed at the last of that, but he only shrugged.

  “Most do not make more than one voyage on the Djinn. The captain hires new sailors often when in Suman ports. No one is paid until he returns to il’Dha’ab Najuum, so most have no coin for food along the way. You must be careful.”

  Wayfarer glanced once at Chap, who appeared to listen closely, but Saeed’s words confused her. He seemed so much better than the other men here.

  “Why have you stayed?” she asked.

  For an instant any kindness in his face faded.

  “It is a good place to hide.” And he held out the apples again. “Take them. Eat one today and hide the other. I do not have much to share, but I am homebound. You need these more than even your companions.”

  She hesitated only a breath before taking the apples. “Thank you.”

  “Eat one quick,” he said. “And do not let anyone see the other.”

  In a flash he was up the stairs again.

  More grateful than she could express, Wayfarer looked down at the apples. But she had no intention of eating one by herself and hiding the other. Stepping down the passage past Chap, she was about to open the door to her cabin.

  —Wait—

  She jumped slightly at that memory-word popping into her head, and, when she turned, Chap still stood farther up the passage.

  —We must . . . talk . . . about . . . Soráno—

  “What do you—”

  —On the docks . . . when we went . . . to find passage . . . for this ship—

  More and more of his memory-words in her head were becoming clearer over time—perhaps because he had been sneaking a peek at her memories far too often. She did not like that, but here and now she was still at a loss for . . .

  —When you touched . . . me . . . and pulled . . . away—

  Wayfarer backed down the passage, away from the cabin door—away from Chap.

  What she thought she had seen in her head had been a mistake, only a flash of imagination. Perhaps he did not even know about the second time, when the anmaglâhk had tried to take her and he had stopped them.

  In all the times she had thought about him—how different he was inside compared to the way he looked—she had tried to see through his eyes and imagine the world of a majay-hì like no other. That was all it had been . . . that one flash of something on the docks of Soráno.

  She did not want it to be anything more.

  —There has been no proper time . . . since then . . . when we were alone— . . . —I need to know—

  Everything that had happened to her had started after learning of those watchful eyes in her people’s forest. Even when she did not catch them staring from the brush, it was as if they were always there, looking at her . . . as he did now.

  Chap stepped closer, and Wayfarer—once called Leanâlhâm—flattened her back against the passage’s wall.

  —Touch me . . . now—

  “Please . . . stop.”

  —Now—

  Even standing, she was short enough that he could have shoved his head into her stomach and knocked her down. But he simply stood there, looking up at her . . . looking at her as so many others of his kind had once done.

  Wayfarer took a shaky breath as she shifted the apples and clutched them to her chest with one arm. As she reached out, she flinched once before her fingertips touched his head between his ears.

  At first nothing happened as she stared into his crystalline eyes, as blue as clear sky. And then she smelled . . . something . . . like a forest floor after a light rain. A flash of white appeared in her thoughts.

  The white majay-hì stood in a space between tall trees in Wayfarer’s homeland. Sunlight caught in a coat of pure white fur, making the female hard to look upon as she padded ahead through the brush. It was not until the female paused, turning her head to look back, that Wayfarer realized . . .

  Flecks in the female’s eyes appeared to turn those blue irises green like her own. She was looking directly into those eyes as if she sat on the forest floor, but she was standing. And when she looked down . . .

  At the sight of paws where her hands should be, Wayfarer’s breaths stopped.

  This had never happened when she had followed the white majay-hì.

  The ship’s corridor reappeared, along with Chap, staring up at her. With a gasp, as if drowning, she pulled her hand back from his head. Then she turned too quickly, trying to get away, and bounced off the passage wall.

  Wayfarer hit the floor. One apple fell from her grip and went tumbling farther down the passage. She rolled over, scooting backward in fright away from Chap . . . and again when he took a step, still staring at her.

  —What did you see?—

  She looked at her hands to make sure they were not paws. Why was he doing this to her?

  —Answer . . . now—

  “A forest . . . my people’s,” she began. “But something . . . someone else who—”

  —Lily . . . You saw Lily?—

  Wayfarer lost her voice. It was not that he put a name on another sacred being; she had come to tolerate that through him. But she had heard that name before in reference to the white female . . . Chap’s own mate, on the other side of the world.

  “What did you do to me?” Wayfarer finally whispered.

  This time he was the one to back away.

  —No . . . not me— . . . —Only you . . . somehow—

  That was even worse.

  “Well, what do we have here?” said a male with a thick accent.

  Wayfarer twisted on the floor to look toward that voice down the passage.

  A spindly and tall Suman sailor stood where the passage’s far end turned to another set of stairs down to the ship’s cargo hold. He grinned, half-toothless, as he tossed the apple she had dropped up in the air and caught it again. His eyes closed halfway in a hardened glare.

  Still gripping the apple, he jerked his head to one side and took a threatening step. “Get out of my way!”

  Wayfarer was too shaken and did not know what to do. A rumble, followed by a snarl, rose behind her.

  Chap lunged forward. Before she could throw herself aside, he pushed off, leaping over her. She twisted back again to see him land and charge.

  The sailor with the apple back-stepped to the corner. Chap cut him off before he could run, so instead he pulled a knife that Wayfarer had not noticed before from his belt.

  Chap, all of his fur on end and his ears flattened, lunged in anyway. He snapped once toward the hand holding the apple.

  Wayfarer thought she heard a door open behind her, but all of her fear was wrapped around the apple in the hand of the thief. Scrambling to her feet, she rushed in behind Chap. She shouted at the sailor, and, amid fearful anger, it came out in her own tongue.

  “Give it to him!”

  The man just stared at her until she pointed at the apple and then Chap. For an instant the sailor might have thought to hold out the apple, but he simply dropped it.

  Chap snatched it in his jaws before it hit the floor. He backed up, still growling, and the man raced off, heading down for the cargo hold.

  “What in the seven hells is all the noise?”

  Wayfarer turned at the foul words normally used by Léshil, but it was Magiere who stood, with her falchion in hand, halfway out of the nearer cabin’s door—and she was naked.

  Wayfarer flushed in staring.

  Magiere swallowed and then almost toppled against the doorframe.

  Léshil, one winged blade in hand, shoved past her, and . . . he was naked as well.

  Wayfarer’s breath caught in
her throat as she spun away, scrunching her eyes closed. She heard scuffling and more awful language behind her, until . . .

  “What happened?” Magiere barked.

  “Nothing . . . nothing,” Wayfarer answered, though she did not know why she had lied. She hesitated before turning, barely opening one eye to peek.

  “I . . . I dropped an apple,” she added, “but Chap retrieved it.”

  Magiere was now half-covered with a blanket, and the greimasg’äh must have come out of the other cabin, as he was standing closer with a stiletto still in hand. Both looked beyond Wayfarer and likely at Chap, with the other apple in his jaws. Wayfarer was thankful that Léshil was no longer in sight, though she still heard him muttering angrily inside the nearer cabin.

  “An apple?” Magiere asked, and then she saw the other one, which Wayfarer still held. “It looks like you two have something to tell us.”

  Wayfarer was uncertain what that referred to, the apples or her lie, but Chap came up beside her with a snort muffled by the apple he had in his jaws.

  Magiere’s brow furrowed. “Wait. We’ll be ready . . . in a few moments.”

  Ducking into the cabin, she slammed the door shut. The last to turn away was Brot’ân’duivé, but he eyed both Wayfarer and then Chap before returning to his own cabin. Wayfarer was again alone with Chap, but another long moment passed before she could look down to find him watching her.

  —We will learn . . . why . . . this is happening to you. . . . I promise—

  Those memory-words did not comfort her as she took the second apple from him. Still, she believed that he had not done this to her. It was not Chap’s fault that she had seen—been forced to see—a memory he had chosen for her.

  It was something further wrong with her.

  Chap scooted closer, and Wayfarer numbly watched as he stuck his nose out toward her hand holding the second apple. It was he this time, and not she, who flinched once before he touched her hand.

  She saw nothing in her head and only heard his words called up from her own memories.

  —Say nothing . . . of . . . what you did . . . with me . . . to Brot’ân’duivé—

  • • •

  Brot’ân’duivé was still puzzled by whatever had happened in the passage. It could not be something as simple as the attempted theft of an ill-gotten apple.

  When he had returned briefly to his cabin, it was only because he knew nothing would be said by the girl or the majay-hì while he remained. Certainly Brot’ân’duivé would hear nothing Chap said unless someone else repeated it. At that, he wondered. . . .

  Leanâlhâm, “Child of Sorrow” . . . Sheli’câlhad, “To a Lost Way” . . . and now Wayfarer might not even tell him what had truly transpired in the passageway.

  It was clear to Brot’ân’duivé that, in whatever had happened, the majay-hì had adequately seen to the girl’s safety. In that, he trusted Chap.

  For a while he waited in his cabin and listened until he heard a door open. It did not surprise him that the girl and majay-hì had gone to Magiere and Léshil first. When he heard that door close again, he stepped out for the same destination.

  At his knock it was Léshil who opened the door, scowled, and turned away.

  Brot’ân’duivé ducked in, closed the door himself, and the room was so quiet that it was obvious that he had interrupted a conversation.

  The left-side bunk where Magiere sat, now hastily dressed, was in disarray: the altercation in the passage had interrupted something else. But any leftover anger was gone from Magiere’s face and posture. Instead she appeared . . . shaken.

  Léshil as well looked shocked and distracted where he stood beyond Magiere in the small cabin’s left rear corner. However, Chap lay on the right-side bunk with his head hanging on his forepaws over the bunk’s edge. His eyes were half-closed as he stared at the floor, as did Wayfarer beside him.

  The apples were still untouched in the girl’s lap.

  “Where did you get those?” Brot’ân’duivé asked.

  Wayfarer blinked twice before looking up at him, as if the question was out of context for whatever was on everyone’s mind.

  “A sailor gave them to me,” she said.

  At that, some of the ire and suspicion returned in Magiere’s expression.

  Wayfarer immediately noticed this as well. “It was Saeed. You know he is very polite . . . and kind.”

  Magiere straightened on the bunk, and Léshil turned to look at the girl. Even Brot’ân’duivé was somewhat surprised at this, considering the way the girl had always reacted to unknown humans, especially males. Only Chap did not move or look up.

  “Léshil,” Wayfarer said calmly, “let me borrow your knife.”

  Brot’ân’duivé watched as she took the knife and began cutting the fruit into slices to be passed out.

  Wayfarer fed a slice to Chap, who wolfed it down in two bites. “Saeed told me that sailors on this ship buy their own food in ports and then hide it,” she continued. “He said that men sometimes fight, even kill, over food.”

  She offered Brot’ân’duivé a piece, which he consumed rapidly, and then passed slices to Magiere and Léshil before biting a piece of her own. Whatever heavy thought had preoccupied her and the others melted in their relief. But a few bites of an apple would not solve the current problem.

  Brot’ân’duivé noted the angry hardness that filled Léshil’s face as he watched the girl sag in exhaustion once the last of the apples was consumed.

  He had joined with Magiere and Léshil—against their wishes—for several reasons, one of which was to learn more about these orbs and why the Ancient Enemy had gone to such great lengths to have them guarded. What he needed most was to learn more of the power the orbs held . . . and whether they could truly be used as a weapon.

  And as to whatever had transpired in this room in the moments before he had entered, that was a more immediate problem to solve. Secrets were a matter of life to Brot’ân’duivé, and he had always been patient in their acquisition and use.

  • • •

  Leesil was still edgy, even after the old shadow-gripper left on some excuse about looking into “purchasing” more food from the crew. When Magiere’s lips parted to say something, Leesil quickly shook his head. Before she could even frown, he stepped in front of Chap and crouched down.

  “Is he really gone?” he whispered.

  Wayfarer looked up in puzzlement.

  With a grumbling huff, Chap climbed off the bunk and stalked over to the cabin door. He sniffed the space between the door’s bottom and the floor and then pricked up his ears as he stood there a moment longer.

  Chap turned back and huffed once for yes.

  And now that they were certain Brot’an was gone . . .

  “Are you sure?” Leesil asked with a quick glance at Wayfarer before he eyed Chap again. “Could it have just been—”

  —No— . . . —Not memory-words . . . I called up— . . . —And not as . . . Wynn hears . . . my thoughts spoken to her—

  “Maybe you did something that—”

  —No— . . . —She saw . . . my chosen memory . . . of my Lily . . . through her own touch— . . . —She . . . relived . . . a moment . . . she could not have had—

  Leesil eyed Wayfarer, and the girl dropped her gaze.

  “How . . . Why?” Magiere demanded.

  This time Chap spoke aloud with three huffs for uncertain or unknown.

  Leesil shook his head and sat down on the floor as Magiere sighed while watching Wayfarer. Still the girl wouldn’t look at anyone.

  Did this have something to do with Wayfarer’s visiting the spirits of her people in name-taking? Had they done something to her, or was it something else about her?

  Leesil, and Magiere, had already tested that the girl couldn’t catch a memory from them through a touch. So was t
his something that only worked with Chap because he was . . . Chap? They didn’t have any other majay-hì around, such as Chap’s daughter, Shade, so they couldn’t test whether it worked with other majay-hì.

  Some might have thought such a thing quite wonderful, but those people would be idiots. The girl had been through enough—too much—and now she was a potential tool, from what Leesil saw of what she could do.

  Chap had been right to keep this from Brot’ân’duivé, for if he had not, Leesil could only imagine how the old assassin might have tried to use the girl. Chap knew things that no one else did—could—including Leesil himself and Magiere.

  Such as where two orbs were hidden far up north.

  If Chap ever let such a memory slip out while Wayfarer was touching him . . .

  Leesil exchanged a worried glance with Magiere, and then he reached out to poke Wayfarer’s leg. Startled by that, she finally looked at him.

  “Well, it could be a good thing,” he said wryly. “Chap can show you some things better than he can describe them with broken words pulled up from our memories. At least in that, the bothersome mutt has less reason to prattle in my head.”

  Chap curled his jowls, and Wayfarer cast Leesil a reproving look—probably over what she considered to be his disrespect to a sacred majay-hì.

  “I’m just saying,” Leesil added quickly, raising both hands in surrender.

  Chapter Fourteen

  When Wynn awoke the following morning, her dizziness was gone, but she still felt weak and tired, as if she hadn’t slept. She found Shade stretched out beside her on the bed, but facing the other way. Wynn sat up and stroked Shade’s head and noticed that Shade’s eyes were open and fixed on the room’s closed door. She wondered whether the dog had done that all night.

  “No more time to lie about,” she said. “We have to make better progress after I messed things up yesterday.”

  Pushing down the covers, Wynn reached for her sage’s robe on the bed’s end.

  Jausiff would not get the better of her today. She knew his approach now: to go on offense and stay there. She could play that game herself. Once dressed, she tied her hair back, but when she went for the door, Shade growled softly, hopped from the bed, and cut her off.