Waters of Salt and Sin: Uncommon World Book One

by Alisha Klapheke

  Both fighting sailors shifted a little in their seats and frowned. They considered gambling a soul fault, same as families who’d never served as slaves, never ridden a horse, or sailed. It was akin to performing Salt Magic.

  “You have no problem with my use of the salt,” I said, wondering how they’d bypassed this soul fault of mine.

  They looked at one another quickly, then Ekrem said, “You used it to save our lives. You have shown your loyalty to our crew mates. We…have decided we may be wrong about Salt Magic.”

  Oron snapped his now spice-stained fingers and talked around a mouthful. “Enough about customs. Let Auntie talk.”

  “Most believe the amir’s young husband died at the quarries, but he did not. He escaped.”

  “Escaped from Quarry Isle on his own?” Oron snorted. “It’s surrounded by chalk cliffs and seastingers and the worst waters of the Pass. Not to mention the bevy of guards with those terrifying spears.”

  “Not impossible,” Aunt said. “He is the only person I know of who found his way out.”

  My heart soared out of my chest and thudded in my heads and hands. I slapped my palms on the table, shaking the dishes and bowls. “If he escaped, so can Avi.”

  Aunt tilted her head and clicked her tongue. “Slow, my child. Slow.”

  “But if you know the story, you know how, right?”

  “I don’t know how he did it.”

  I sat back, closing my eyes against the pounding in my head. “Then why tell us? What does this have to do with anything?”

  “The amir took a new husband, and though he did not live long, the man at the quarry heard of it. He escaped, only to die in the waters of the Pass.”

  “He became a wraith.”

  “The great and terrible wraith called Tuz Golge.”

  “And you believe Tuz Golge Infused Calev and forced him to kill the amir?”

  “There used to be tales of Tuz Golge on our shores. Tales of the sky-clouding wraith the size of a full ship’s sail that would scour travelers’ minds, looking for a link to the amir. But that was many years ago. Nothing has been heard of the wraith in a long time.”

  I dug at the wood grain of Aunt’s table, eyeing the bowl of sea salt on the shelf beside the window. “He was waiting for an opportunity to kill the amir. It was revenge.”

  Ekrem stood, turned toward the back of the room, and ran his hands through his hair. “I trusted there was an explanation, but this…”

  Serhat spoke softly. “You told us truth, Kinneret Raza. Your man was Infused. He is an innocent.”

  Her crewmate whirled. “And we have no one to punish for this outrage.”

  “I thought you hated the amir after what she did to Ifran,” Oron said.

  Ekrem put his hands on the table and faced Oron. “Disagreeing with her decisions is one thing. Murder is another.”

  Aunt pushed my bowl of chicken toward me like she wanted me to eat. “It is. There is nothing now you can do to punish Tuz Golge. He has what he wants. A dead lover. But you can gain information from him.”

  “He could tell us how he escaped from Quarry Isle.” The idea chilled my bones.

  “Whoa, now.” Oron got up and began pacing. The hot breeze through the windows tossed his hair and tunic. “Good woman, you expect us to meet with a Salt Wraith on purpose? To question the thing?” His eyes couldn’t grow any larger.

  Aunt grabbed his sleeve as he walked past. “To save my sister’s daughter, I do.”

  Oron closed his eyes. After a breath, he nodded. “For Avigail. Sweet, strong Avigail.”

  Pressing my fingers into my temples, I inhaled the food’s scent of orange spice and the incense. I had to do this. I had to confront a wraith and speak with it. I looked to Calev, lying on the floor. I needed Calev to heal and be strong enough to help me.

  “Tell me what to do, Aunt.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  We decided not to move Calev for the night. Aunt and I washed him and wrapped him in a clean pair of loose Kurakian pants, leaving his back and his wound bare. I tried to sleep beside him, but all I did was stare at his eyelids and pray they’d open soon.

  The others slept on hammocks at the other side of the room near the ladder leading to the courtyard. Aunt curled up in her own sling of netted fabric above the shelves. The night was noisy with cattle lowing, people snoring, and roosters unwilling to wait until dawn to give a shout.

  Aunt had told me when the moon reached its height, she’d wake and show me the Salt Magic needed to converse with a wraith.

  I swallowed. Never thought I’d need to know a horrible thing like that.

  The moon glowed through the window. It had to be near to time.

  Aunt slipped from her hammock onto a low stool and to the floor. “Come.”

  Had she heard me? Or did she just wake herself up. I couldn’t decide which was creepier. Aunt was a comfort half the time, and a full-on scary mystery the other.

  I took a breath and ran a finger down Calev’s proud nose. I touched his lips, his bare shoulder. He was just so beautiful. The wound didn’t look any better though. If anything, the puffy red around the entry had grown more swollen.

  “Refill your salt bag first.” Aunt looked to her bowl on the shelf.

  I shivered under her warm hand and did as instructed.

  Prepared, we walked past the others in their hammocks. Oron grabbed my hand and I jumped.

  “If you can, give that spirit a kick to the babymaker for me, kaptan,” he said. Then he rolled over and resumed snoring.

  A smile pushed at my mouth, but my lip trembled and I bit it, holding back emotions good and bad.

  Aunt climbed down the ladder that passed through a hole in the floor, and I trailed behind, down one level, another, the last. I marveled that the structure was made of only the earth. Each floor was thicker than two Orons placed side by side. When my feet hit dirt, I spun to see which direction Aunt had gone.

  My pulse tapped nervously against my wrists. Aunt walked into the night, a stately column of bright fabric and braids, surrounded by the still shadows of her cattle in the moonlight. The night smelled like a storm, metallic and heavy, though no clouds plumed overhead.

  Beyond her gate, we found a spot to sit beside the twisting trunk of a Topa tree. The old leaves, crushed under my sandals, smelled like vegetables. Cool, rainy, tart. Aunt pulled a handful of salt from her pouch and jerked her chin at me, her big, black eyes shining.

  “You too.”

  Reaching into my bag, I did as she instructed, then sat with salt cupped in my hands like a baby bird.

  With her free hand, Aunt removed the whip from her leather belt. It was her status symbol in Kurakian society. Finer whips, those with more tassels, more gems, more decoration, spoke of more cattle—the only measure of who you were here on this dry land. The whip snapped as she lashed it over her head. I jumped. I didn’t have a whip.

  “You will use your own physical representation of pride.” Her white teeth showed behind a chilling smile. “Show the spirit your confidence, your core.”

  Her eyes closed, she began speaking low, murmuring words into the night. The hairs on my arms lifted. She laid her whip in her lap and clapped her hands together. The salt she’d held ballooned around her and hovered before falling like waterflakes to her nightdress.

  Her magic was already working. This wasn’t any small lesson on using the salt. She was trying something. Now.

  “But there aren’t any wraiths here,” I said. “On land. I thought you were only going to teach me.”

  Her gaze flicked to my face, faster than her whip’s strings. “If I do this right, we will hear a wraith, even at this distance from the sea waters. If you follow what I do on the Pass, the wraith will fly to your boat and you will not only hear its true words, but see its face.”

  Ice jolted through me. “The spirit’s human face?”

  Wraiths’ humanlike form showed only white, crystalized shadows where the face would be. My flesh shr
unk against my bones. What would it be like to look at a dead man’s face? A dead man who’d been tortured through a death at sea? Through drowning? The very worst way to die?

  Aunt didn’t answer me. She kept on hissing and mumbling in Kurakian over and over, the rhythm of her words matching that of the night insects around us. Rumrumrum, ruuuummmmm. Rumrumrum, ruuuuuummmmm.

  With salt-dusted fingertips, she drew a circle, starting at the small, curling hairs escaping her braid and falling onto her forehead and going all the way down her cheek, across her chin, and back up again. She ran one finger along the inside of her lips.

  When she said something that sounded like Nat-kooroo-turumtah, her voice was no longer hers. Or, it was, but it sounded as though it belonged to someone five times her size, with a much deeper tone.

  The insects went silent.

  The wind rushed through the Topa in a sudden gust.

  The sky was clear though the air still smelled like a storm.

  Invisible splinters pinched the skin around my spine and along my ribs. Aunt said another word. Another. Her voice rang in my ears. The prickling hit me again. The wind. Once. Twice.

  Then I heard it, the wraith.

  It started as a noise so far-off, so quiet, I wasn’t sure it was even a noise. Maybe my own heart or lungs, but the noise grew legs and ran into my head, thrusting a spear into my thoughts.

  There were no words, only intent, specific intent that my mind shaped into words.

  What do you want, Salt Witch?

  “To hear your voice,” Aunt said in the Jakobden tongue.

  I have no need of you.

  “We want to speak with Tuz Golge.”

  Humor. Sickness.

  One chooses one’s own death.

  “This one here witnessed the Tuz Golge’s vengeance played out on earth.”

  No business of mine. I leave you to it.

  “Wait!” Aunt held up her salty hands and nodded.

  Sweat broke over my scalp. There wasn’t time to think. I had to learn how to do this, for Avi, for me.

  I raised my hands and threw my salt into the leaves of the Topa, into the night. Closing my eyes, I let the salt fall onto my face. Grains danced on my lips.

  “I ask you to stay,” I said, my voice strong and clear in spite of the fear of the invisible presence lurking around us. I opened my eyes.

  The wraith wailed.

  My aunt stared at me. Her eyes went up and down. “Release him, Kinneret. I know what I need to know.”

  A frown pulled at my lips. But she’d wanted me to try to keep him there, hadn’t she?

  “Now, Kinneret. Release him.”

  I blew the rest of the salt lining my palms into the air beside us. “Go and find rest,” I said.

  The wind gusted once more. The prickling sensation fled and my shoulders relaxed. The small part of the wraith that we’d managed to call over land was gone.

  Aunt tucked her whip into her belt, stood, and offered her hand. One thousand questions in my head, I took it and started back toward the courtyard.

  “Why did you let him go?” I said. “What did you find out?”

  She made a noise like a hum. Mother had always made that noise and now Avi did. It was a noise like she was thinking.

  “You are the strongest Salt Witch that breathes, Kinneret.”

  I stopped. “What?”

  “You are. You held that wraith, made him cry out.”

  “I’m not a witch. I’m only using prayers. Using the salt the Fire gives us.”

  “Same. It is the same.”

  “Not to me.”

  Then she stopped too, her hand on the top of her stick gate. “Maybe that is what gives you such power.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t fret about it. You are who you are. I am who I am. It is what it is.”

  I rolled my eyes. Kurakian wisdom. More riddle than reason, Father always said.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Back at Calev’s side, I let the tears come.

  Everyone else was sleeping, so they wouldn’t see my weakness. I simply lay there for what felt like days, praying and wishing and longing for Avi’s voice and Calev’s grin like a thirsty man on a salty sea. I didn’t want to know what a wraith’s voice sounded like and I didn’t want to think about having strong magic right now. I wanted sunlight and freedom and everyone safe and happy. Avi and Calev were my fresh water, my life source. I had to have them back. Without them, I’d shrivel and die like a fish out of water.

  “Please wake up,” I whispered to Calev, my throat aching. “Aunt says we can control the wraith who Infused you. It knows how to get Avi out of Quarry Isle. Wake up and we’ll go. We’ll go get our girl.”

  A sob took my breath, and I sucked air through my nose, trying to keep quiet. I put a hand on Calev’s forehead. The bare skin felt odd bare of its normal headtie.

  It was more odd the way heat rolled off his skin and into mine.

  I jerked away. No.

  His cheeks looked like they’d been slathered with fat, waxen and swollen.

  “Calev? Can you hear me?” He was so hot. I lifted his arm to see where the arrow had punctured his body. A firey red glared back at me and yellow pus leaked from the center.

  The wound was going bad.

  I ran to Aunt and shook her shoulder hard. “Calev’s getting worse.”

  She licked her dry lips and blinked. “I told you he might die.”

  A spear went through me at her bluntness, but she smoothed my cheek with her rough fingers and I knew she was just worried too. I grabbed my shirt and squeezed the fabric between my burning fingers.

  “You have to save him.”

  Swinging out of her hammock, she sighed. “He has to save himself.”

  With a stone mortar and pestle, Aunt ground bitter smelling herbs and animal fat into a poultice for Calev’s souring wound.

  For hours, we nursed him.

  Poured fresh water over his lips, only to watch it dribble to the floor. Wiped his flaming face with cloths.

  His eyes never opened.

  I ran a fingertip over the slight bump in his nose, as familiar to me as my own features. He inhaled slightly, a ragged, weak breath and my own chest clenched, wanting to breathe for him, to be strong for him. I hovered a hand over his wound and heat blared through Aunt’s wrappings. The skin around the strips of linen had reddened even more over the last hours.

  Her herbs and our prayers weren’t making him better, but that didn’t mean I was giving up.

  Please, Fire. Let me keep him a while longer. We still have so much to do. Let him see Avi safe. I need him to help me save Avi. Please. Please. Please.

  My hands shook as I stared at him. His face became Father’s, then Mother’s, and I was a child again, losing my parents.

  I ran to the window and threw up everything in my stomach.

  It was all going wrong, so, so, so wrong. If I failed now, Oron would never stay here with me and my aunt. He loved the sea like me. Zayn would die alone, blaming himself for our end. My sweet, little sister was lost to a horrible, disgusting life at the quarries. I clutched at my hair, squeezing it to the roots and welcoming the pain. And now, I was losing my love, my Calev, my smile and my luck. My lungs fought a breath and I fell to my knees, Aunt’s hands on my back and her whispers in my ear.

  As dawn cut the room with light and Aunt took to her hammock, I curled up next to Calev, resting on his outstretched arm. His dry palm lay against my mine own and I cried until I was an empty husk.

  This entire trip had been for nothing.

  I’d found silver I couldn’t use. I’d thrown Avi from one hell into another.

  I could never glean information from Tuz Golge. I hadn’t even known Calev was Infused. I was clueless, a fool, a stupid, stupid low-caste with no chance of the life I’d dreamt of. The sleeve of Calev’s loose tunic pressed wrinkles into my forehead.

  I was an idiot and all of this was my fault.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-O
NE

  Then one of Calev’s eyelids lifted. Gasping, I put a hand on his cheek.

  “Calev?” I whispered.

  His eye closed and I sagged, lying next to him.

  Seas, what could I do?

  If it weren’t for Avi, I’d wait here with him forever. Avi needed me to at least try to rescue her. I could never live with myself if I didn’t fight for her. But if I left, would Calev wake up and not find me? What if…my eyes blurred…if he died while I was gone and only had Aunt, a stranger to him…

  My chest wanted to split open. This was a pain worse than anything that an arrow or a yatagan could cause. It seared and gnawed and swallowed me whole.

  Calev made a small noise.

  I sat up.

  He opened his eyes, blinked, then closed them.

  I touched his shoulder. Was Aunt’s magic finally working? “Can you hear me?”

  It was little more than a hiss, but I heard the word.

  “Yes,” he said.

  The room spun for a breath and I took a gulp of air. “You’re going to be fine. You’re strong.”

  “Fine?” he croaked, barely loud enough to for me to hear. “Not sure about that.”

  I laughed through tears. “Stay quiet. Rest. Next time you wake up, you can talk more. All right?”

  He must’ve agreed because his eyes flickered once, and not long after, his breathing evened out in sleep.

  Aunt’s magic was healing him.

  I don’t know how much of the night passed as we slept there, but when I opened my eyes, I saw Calev’s smile. Pale, weak, but real.

  The wildfire in me rose and dried my tears. “How do you feel? Any better? Can you breathe well?” I touched his shoulder, then pulled away. She’d healed him. The magic had actually worked. I could hardly wrap my mind around it. I was scared to say it aloud and risk it not being true.

  Calev laughed quietly and winced. Moving so that his forehead braced against the stripes of the mat, he said, “I am better. Much, much better.” He put his palms against the mat and began to push himself up.