“Tiaraku brought the storm,” she said with sudden, leaden certainty. “He must know we’re coming. Is he going to sink us?”
“Tiaraku sees many things. I would not be surprised if he has kept his eye on you. There is nothing on his island that escapes his notice.”
“The mirrors. Bartolo had one.”
“Tiaraku has more. But there are ways to avoid him,” Leofric said. “He is good at making enemies, and those enemies are good at making sure they don’t fall into his clutches. He can only see what he is looking for, just like anyone else. We can find help, but the first step is to make it ashore.”
“That may not be so easy,” Megrithe said as a howling wall of wind slammed into the little ship, causing it to careen sideways into an oncoming wave. “Oh – are you all right?”
“Fine, fine,” Leofric said, rubbing his forehead where he had smacked it into a beam, taken off balance by the sudden motion. “Nikko always says my skull is as thick as a ram’s. For once, I’m glad he’s right.”
Megrithe smiled, and assured Leofric that she would be fine as long as she had a basin and a glass of water nearby. When he had left for the safety of his own dry quarters, she curled up in her hammock and drew the blanket right up over her head, trying to block out the whistling wail of the wind while a few stray tears found their way down her face.
She was deeply frustrated by the delay, which she could do absolutely nothing to rectify, and Leofric’s innocent comment was making her feel inexplicably lonely.
She was an independent person by nature, and the notion of living alone had never scared her. But dying alone was a different matter – one she never really thought she would have to consider. She was still young, and her career was just blooming, and there had always seemed to be plenty of time to settle down to the business of sorting out the rest of her life.
But after the terror of the Siheldi and the shock of waking up half way around the world with no one but the coldly mercurial eallawif to anchor her to a strange new reality in which everyone was an enemy, time didn’t seem so much on her side any longer, and the tenderness with which her two companions spoke about each other was like a jabbing needle ripping out seams she had always thought to be entirely secure.
It had nothing to do with Arran Swinn, she told herself as her breath collected hot and damp around her cheeks. And she was certainly not using his distress to mask the urgency of her own. If anything, she should be furious with him. She should hate him for ruining her career, nearly ending her life, exposing her to the madness of the mountain under the ocean and the predatory spirits that lurked within its rotten core.
She should be livid. So why couldn’t she help wishing that he was there to take her hand again to reassure her, like he had done as they wandered the tunnels under Sind Heofonne?
It was just an illusion, she told herself as she turned over and drew her knees up to her chin, trying to stop her insides from quaking. It wasn’t Arran Swinn she wished for. It was anyone. It just so happened that he had been the last one to be close to her, in whatever small way. If she died on Niheba seeking his fate, she would never be close to anyone again, and that thought made her weary soul whimper in despair.
A galloping lurch started her bed swinging, and she found herself praying that Arran’s judgment of sails and timber was sounder than his ability to keep himself out of trouble. The prayers continued through the uneasy night. Megrithe was certain that she could hear the shrieking cries of the Siheldi mixed with the yowling wind.
She clutched her covers close and her red iron pendant closer, drifting into fitful, broken sleep that somehow carried her through to the morning.
But there was no golden dawn to greet her groggy eyes that day, nor even the day after. The storm raged for countless hours, sheathing them in black, driving downpour and bitterly angry squalls. She had lost count of how many times Nikko had come to empty the sloshing bucket by her side, but she was continually amazed at how often her sore stomach still saw fit to fill it.
It was damp, miserable, dark, and dreary, and she wished for nothing more than a moment of stillness on solid land and legs that didn’t wobble every time she tried to stand up straight. Like most of her wishes, however, it was not about to come true: the tossing continued for at least three days, her apprehension and fretfulness reaching a sharpness that not even her sickness could blunt as the maelstrom raged on.
On the fourth morning, the endless dripping of water through the planks finally slowed, the towering surf calmed, and the clouds began to clear. In the pearly, weeping sky, there were no more signs of whispery plumes of smoke to the north. In fact, when she finally ventured out of her cabin to stand on her toes and lean over the rail, the squat dome of the island had disappeared entirely.
“We seem to have lost our destination. Will we not reach the island this morning?” she said to Durville when he stumped by, seemingly intent on not speaking to her. She could walk more quickly than he could with his wooden foot, however, and she did not let him escape until he turned to answer her question.
“No, we will not reach the island this morning,” he replied gruffly, jerking his chin upwards. “Nor any other damn morning if the gods have anything to say about it.”
She followed his gaze to the mainmast. “It’s broken,” she said, peering between the tangles of ropes. She knew little about ships, but even she could see that the rigging was somewhat more disordered than she was used to, and the bulk of the timber sat jaggedly askew, nearly touching its neighbor.
“Aye. Well broken, at that. I’ve seen green fire storms come up unnatural before. Ain’t no good in ‘em for me or my crew.”
“Green fire storms?”
Durville pointed to the split in the great spar, where the beam was charred and disfigured. “Spirit fire. Burns clean through wood and iron, but will leave your skin untouched. It’s the devil’s work. The Siheldi were toying with us.”
Megrithe felt her shivers return. “How soon can you fix it?”
“Soon as we get back to Paderborn, miss. I’ll have my lads rig up something workable in the meanwhile. The rudder is just about as knackered, too, but we’ll be off home by midday, I hope.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Ain’t no one wants us on that isle, miss,” Durville said, scratching at his beard. “Spirit fire is clear enough a sign of that.”
“Your captain – your friend is out there,” she protested. “And I hired you to –”
“I don’t remember any gold coming into my hand,” Durville said sharply. “I remember some long days in a crowded prison and some high words from an inspector with no right to be so prim and proper after all she’s done.
“I came here as a courtesy that’s extended long past what’s owed you, and I’ve got naught but grief for it. We’ve had nothing but storms and spirits from there to here, and I ain’t losing this ship in addition to what’s gone already.”
“But Arran –”
“Arran is my friend, to be sure, but he’s a man of the sea first,” Durville said. “He knows when it’s right to save a livelihood instead of losing it all to try to help one gone soul. He’s made the decision himself when he’s had to. That’s what it comes down to when you own a hundred lives. There’s no point in losing the investment when the man is probably long dead.”
“That’s horrible,” she snapped. “You don’t know that at all. Don’t you trust the eallawif? She said he was alive.”
“And you said he put a knife in his own gut. Am I not to trust you over a cold-hearted ghost? How about trusting my friend to do what he puts his mind to? I’ve seen him do what it takes to get out of a tight spot, even when it ain’t pretty. He’s damn good at what he does when he needs to do it. You don’t survive going up against someone like him, Miss Prinsthorpe. What makes you think he would survive himself?”
“He’s not dead,” she said, feeling tears pricking at her eyes. “And I can’t believe you’d come all the way within si
ght of land just to turn around again. It’s not fair, and it’s not right.”
“It ain’t fair to expect my crew to drown for a captain who left them,” Durville replied, gesturing to the men who had gathered around to listen to the row. “I could try for a week to get closer to that island, and I will wager you my weight in silver that every time we turn north, there will be a storm to stop us. If it ain’t the Siheldi causing it, then it’s the neneckt. You don’t know how many times I’ve already stopped these lads from throwing your little fellow over.”
A wave of agreement swept through the crowd of sailors. They had had enough, and it was clear that Nikko was a particularly sore spot for skins already scraped rough by the ceaseless seas.
“You can’t do that,” Megrithe said, looking around nervously, wondering why she couldn’t seem to muster up the authority that she draped around her like a velvet cape when she had been speaking on behalf of the Guild. “He has done nothing to you. No one has done anything.”
“And if you want to keep it that way, you won’t argue when we make our way south,” Durville said. “It don’t please me, Miss Prinsthorpe, but I won’t be losing my life for a dead man today.”
“Then give me a boat,” she said when she had taken in the blank, stony faces and crossed arms that surrounded her. “I’ll go myself.”
The sailors started laughing. “It’s fifteen miles, miss,” Durville said. “Your arms would fall off before you made it a quarter.”
“I will take her,” Leofric said, moving up to stand next to Megrithe. “And Nikko will come with us. Would that not solve your problem? You’d be rid of all of us, and then you could do as you please.”
“Begging your pardon, sir, but you don’t got no more experience on the open water than the lady,” Durville said in a somewhat less condescending tone. “The currents are too strong for a longboat as small as we have. You’d never make it to land.”
“I suggest you let us try,” said Leofric.
“Is that really a good idea?” Megrithe whispered as Durville considered, consulting with his helmsman for a moment.
“Nikko will take care of it,” Leofric told her.
Megrithe turned to look at the neneckt, who was standing quietly off to one side, and Nikko winked at her.
“I can’t say that I’d be willing to stop you, sir,” Durville said slowly when he seemed to have taken the measure of his men’s minds. “But I can’t recommend it, neither.”
“I think you already have,” Leofric said. “You want us gone, and we want to get gone. Let’s not delay any further. Miss Prinsthorpe, I suggest you collect your baggage.”
The sailors were already readying the longboat before Megrithe had made it back to her cabin to grab her knapsack. It didn’t really seem like a good idea to jump into an open boat with nothing but unsettled waves from horizon to horizon, but she had brought Leofric with her to help her solve problems, and he seemed fairly confident about this one. The only other option was to turn around, a prisoner of Durville’s sense of self-preservation, and that she simply would not do.
“Ready,” she said to Leofric as Durville silently handed him a canvas bag filled with enough bread and water to last them a few days, just in case the tugging currents and stormy seas turned into more than they could handle. Nikko was already in the boat, which was bobbing alarmingly next to the ship’s patched side, and Megrithe swallowed hard as she realized that she would have to climb down the vessel’s flank with nothing more than a few shallow wooden ledges to serve as steps and a fraying rope to guide her.
“Thank you for taking us this far,” she managed to say as Durville saw them off. “When I see Mister Swinn, shall I tell him that you have decided to take sole possession of his ship?”
Durville snorted a laugh. “You think I’m stealing from him?”
“It certainly has that appearance.”
The sailing master shook his head. “When you see him, you can ask him about what happened on Kittling Island if you want to put your mind at rest.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’ve known him for much longer than you have, miss, and a great deal better, too. If you think I’ve given up on him just so I can take his tub for a ride, you’re mistaken. I’d be overjoyed to give it back to him, and I hope I’ll be able to. I just think his luck ran out the day he met you.”
Megrithe tried to make herself as small as possible in the boat as Leofric took up the oars and pushed them away from the Tortoise’s side. It seemed much colder so close to the gray surface of the angry water, and there was nothing to impede the wind. She listened to the echo of Durville’s voice giving the orders that would turn the ship back towards Paderborn as they slowly pulled away from each other, the sailing master’s last words lingering in her mind like a bee sting.
It was only a few moments before she looked up from her clasped hands in her lap, but the Tortoise already seemed miles away, half-swallowed by the sea as it slipped gently over the curve of the earth. Nikko was standing up in the bows, complaining loudly as he took off his jacket and started to undo the laces of his shirt.
“I cannot believe you’re making me do this,” he said as Leofric watched with half a smile on his lips. “This is humiliating.”
“Shut up and take your clothes off,” Leofric replied, putting his chin in his hand, the oars abandoned.
“What on earth are you doing?” Megrithe cried as Nikko started to step out of his breeches.
“Saving the prince here some much-needed hard labor,” Nikko said, now entirely naked as Megrithe turned scarlet and covered her eyes. “There he sits, growing fatter by the second, as I do all the work.”
“You can’t have thought I’d be rowing us all the way to the harbor,” Leofric said as Nikko put his foot on the rail and launched himself over the side of the boat, disappearing instantly into the water. “He’ll pull us.”
Megrithe let out a little yelp as the boat suddenly accelerated, gripping the bench while the vessel leveled off at a clip that would seem respectable to a well-bred coach and four.
“We’ll be there in an hour or so,” Leofric said, sitting back and closing his eyes as the breeze washed over him. “And I’ll only have to handle a week of his moaning afterward.”
Ordinarily, she would have found the experience enchanting. She was quite fond of horses, and rode in the Guild hunt every year, out in the rolling countryside behind the city’s limits, chasing deer or boar at a flying gallop through the hedges and forests, competing not just for the prize, but for the gamesmanship of the ride.
But as they hurtled towards the island, the stiff wind now laden with the scent of green land, she couldn’t shake the memory of the blank opposition and stubborn superstition that had lingered among Durville and his crew. The game she was playing now was against powers more terrifying than any wild animal, and the stakes were much higher than the temporary pique of a missed arrow or the inconvenience of a lost horseshoe.
The feeling of speed was unsettling as the boat skimmed over the tops of the tossing waves, and she felt as if her stomach was about to start its complaining again. Megrithe tried to ignore it as she kept her eyes firmly on the sky, worried that they were too low to the water to see a new bank of clouds rolling in until it was too late. The rowboat was a smaller target than the Tortoise, but she didn’t think that it was small enough to escape Tiaraku’s wrath.
It took closer to two hours, in fact, both of which were long and chilly, dashed by spray and whipped by the icy stirrings of the air, but eventually the island appeared in front of them, its dark cliffs looming like a monument to some long-forgotten war. The swooping slope of the stony formations guided them towards the harbor plainly enough, but Nikko slowed them down while they were still beyond the view of the island’s lookouts, not wishing to attract undue attention with their curious flight.
“Thank you,” Leofric said to him when he had gotten back in the boat, shaking out his curly hair like a dog bef
ore giving his partner a kiss. “I’ve always said you are a marvel.”
“You could stand to say it more often,” Nikko replied, reaching for his trousers as Megrithe stared steadily over the stern until he had dressed himself. “You didn’t get seasick again, dear, did you?” he asked Megrithe as Leofric took up the oars in earnest this time. “You look a bit unwell.”
“No, I’m fine,” she said, doing her best to smile. “That really was wonderful of you.”
“The sooner we get there, the sooner we can leave,” he said, yawning and stretching as Leofric steadied them on their course again.
Soon enough, the current took over the task of pulling them towards Niheba’s shores, leaving Leofric with little to do but steer the fragile craft away from the bigger ships that sat in the port, huddled down against the storm that had kept them idle.
Megrithe could smell the smoke again, and part of her imagined that the tension in the tautly furled sails and slapping of the water on pitch-covered hulls was due to more than just the wild weather.
“Why isn’t there anyone about?” she asked Nikko when she had figured out what was wrong. The harbor was as quiet as a graveyard.
“Maybe it wasn’t a warehouse,” he said, looking closely at the shore as he tucked the cuffs of his trousers into his boots. “Maybe there were deaths in the city.”
“The rain would have washed the smell away if it was something small,” Leofric agreed as they sidled up to a low dock. “Jump up and throw me that rope, will you?” he directed towards Nikko, who nodded and sprang onto the planks without any of his usual tart comments.
A few moments later, Leofric had handed Megrithe onto the dry land that she had craved, only to find that her legs weren’t anywhere near as prepared to make the adjustment as her mind wished them to be. It took her some time before she could walk without wobbling: long enough for Leofric to secure the boat, remove their baggage, and start guiding her with a firm hand on her elbow towards the district’s main thoroughfare.
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