Captain Iscra stared first at Patro, then Kane, and finally his gaze landed back on Darian. "Unwrap his head. I want him to hear every single word I have to say. And I have plenty to say."
"Unwrap, sir?" Patro started, only to have Iscra interrupt him.
"Do not think, young Ice Walker, that I do not know you can draw your ice back into yourself just as easily as you released it. I just watched you trying to mold that ice around Darian without Kane being encased also, and you had to draw it back from Kane as you used that same ice to wrap Darian up. This is not a time for games."
"Captain, sir, maybe-"
"No Patro, you will do as I say, and you will do it right now." The Captain could barely get the words out, he was so furious.
Once Patro had freed Darian's head, the three could see just how furious Darian was. His eyes, normally an emerald green, were glowing with a hint of what appeared to be flames. Before anyone could say anything, Darian started swearing that as soon as he was free, he would kill Kane.
Before he could say much more, the Captain did the unthinkable and reached out and slapped Darian. Not hit him with his fist, but slapped him across the mouth. The shock on Darian's face was priceless to his two benyans. Before any of the Lyra could recover from the shock of seeing Darian get slapped by the Captain, he began to speak.
"I am the captain of this ship, I am, or will be, a subject to the four of you when you bond your Shadow Walker to your Lyra. I am proud to have been chosen to be not just a captain of a Ship of the Line, but the captain of your flagship. There is no greater honor than to be a captain of one of these types of ships. I have lived 2000 years, and I have seen more than the three of you can even imagine, but I have never seen any of our race so childish, so irresponsible, so out of control as the three of you. Two days ago, I had the pleasure of watching the scroll of maturity come to life on your shoulder blades. Physically, you are mature, but that maturity does not mean you are mentally or emotionally mature. In comparison to the Lyriant race, you would be about the age of twelve or so, physically capable of breeding, but way too young to understand. I know that you have some maturing to do, but I am this close–" at that Iscra put his thumb and finger almost touching, "–to throwing all three of you overboard. I cannot believe I chose to babysit you to find your Shadow Walker. This is what we are going to do—or I will turn this ship around and take you straight back home. I know, from hearing you talk, that you all have an emptiness—an ache—to find your Shadow Walker and complete the bond, then return to bond with your dragons." Turning, he looked at Kane, "You go on and on about your dragon and how you cannot wait to return to her. I will return all three of you to Decca if you do not grow up and do it now. You will step off the ship when we get to the port, you will get your Shadow Walker, and you will immediately return to the ship. You will not leave the ship again until we are again in Decca."
Darian started to speak, but the Captain spoke right over him, "And do not even think of trying to replace me or threatening to replace me. I know, and you know, it takes a long time to weave the bond between a captain and the ship." Smirking, he continued, "And I also know the reason I was chosen is because I am the very best captain our race has for my age, and age is certainly a factor in choosing a captain—so don't even think about trying to replace me. Furthermore, I know my blood in some manner called to this ship, or this ship to my blood, or maybe I was called to one of you."
Iscra looked at Darian, who had calmed down by the time he finished talking, then Darian looked at Kane and Patro with a bit of desperation in his eyes. Kane's shoulders slumped, and when Iscra looked again, Patro was becoming one with his shield—he looked like he was actually molding his body into the shield. Iscra narrowed his eyes and looked back at Kane, and then Darian, then back to where he had just watched Patro vanish into the shield.
Looking back at Kane, he quietly asked, "Is there something you boys want to tell me?"
Kane, wide-eyed, started shaking his head and inching back toward the shield again. Before Iscra could stop him, he saw Kane form a shield, touching Patro's shield, and silently molding it around his body. Staring at the shield that now contained Patro and Kane, Iscra was taken aback. Looking back at Darian, he said, “I had no idea they could do that."
Walking up to the block of ice surrounding Darian, he quietly told him, "I do not know what is going on, but you will tell me everything and you will tell me now, or I will turn this ship around and I will not bring you back until you grow up some more. And do not even think of trying to get anyone else to bring you. No one sails a Lyra on a ship when a Ship of the Line exists. And there is not a captain alive who would take you anywhere if the captain of your ship will not. Blood binds us to this ship, and to each other in ways scarcely understood. Start talking and I may be persuaded to continue to port."
Darian looked utterly defeated by the time Iscra was done speaking this time. Glancing over one last time to the double shield where his two benyans had vanished, leaving him to face the wrath of their captain alone, he gave up trying to hide what was going on, and began to tell Iscra just how badly he had misjudged being able to find their Shadow Walker. When he was finished, Iscra was rubbing his head with his hand.
"Let me get this straight—you do not know anything about your Shadow Walker, not where to find them, not their sex, not even how to find them?"
Darian nodded sheepishly.
Taking a deep breath, Iscra asked, "So how did you plan to find them if you don't know anything about them?"
"Well, we could feel them really strongly when we were at home. I mean really strong, like a giant soul thread pulling us, but it turns out that the closer we got, the more scattered the threads became. I finally figured out that it must be possible for any number of people to bond to us as a Shadow Walker. And, well, I did not know that."
Iscra was shaking his head, "No one told you how to find this person?"
Darian looked very sheepish when he told Iscra, "We left before we had our meeting with the watchers and the Lyra Brycentia. I think they were going to give us final instructions."
Iscra could well understand why Kane constantly seems to feel the need to hit Darian. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath. "But you felt you knew what you were doing, and you left before they told you what you needed to know." Taking another deep breath, he continued, "I would be willing to bet the reason they don't tell you before you are twenty-five is to keep you from coming over and trying to bond to the wrong person." Dropping his head, he took a few more deep breaths. "Do you have plans now? How to find the person? Where to go?"
Darian shook his head. "No, not really. We were so sure we could walk right up to them and everything would just, I don't know, click, I guess."
Closing his eyes, Captain Iscra stood silent for awhile, a very long while. Finally opening his eyes, he resignedly told Darian, "Get your benyans out of the ice—I had no idea they could do that, anyway—get them out, and all of you return to your common room. I do not want to see you until the three of you have a valid working plan that I approve of. If I do not approve of the plan you come up with when this trading is done, you will return home, in disgrace, apparently, but you will return home for the instructions you thought you were too smart to wait for, do you understand me?"
Darian nodded and then watched as Captain Iscra approached the shield keeping them private from the rest of the ship, looking at it then back at Darian the Captain finally asked, "how exactly to I get through the shield if both your benyans are, um, hiding." As soon as he had finished talking a hole just large enough for him to go through opened in the shield. Shaking his head in amazement and looking back once more at where Patro had cocooned himself in the shield the Captain left the area.
Chapter Five
Patro opened his shield enough to peek out, and seeing Kane doing the same thing, he stepped out of his shield. Both young men looked at Darian, and then in the direction the Captain had disappeared. After a few moments o
f silence, Darian, finally resigned, asked Patro to let him out.
After staring at each other for a few more moments, Kane finally said, "Well you heard him, to the common room until we can figure out a plan."
The three turned to go below, but Patro's shield was in the way. Raising his eyebrows at Patro, Kane said, "The shield?"
After Patro dropped the shield, the three dejectedly trooped down below to their common room. Dropping into chairs, the three just stared at each other some more. Finally, Patro asked, "Do you think he was telling the truth?"
Kane said, "About what?"
Shrugging, Patro said, "The only ship that will take a Lyra is the Ship of the Line if they have one, which we do." Motioning to the ship around them.
Darian and Kane both shrugged. Darian looked thoughtful for a while, and then said, "Remember last summer when we went to Kario and we wanted to go out on a cruise? The captain of the cruise ship took one look at us and refused. That was right after we bonded our Ship of the Line to us and Captain Iscra and the crew. My dad went and talked with the captain, and the captain said he could not take us out. I remember my dad asking, ‘Cannot, or will not,’ and the captain said, ‘For them, it is the same thing,’ and pointed back at us. Now Captain Iscra says no one will take us, so I guess he is right. I was upset; I remember it very clearly. I wanted to go back out on the sea."
Kane nodded, "I remember that, I wondered why we could not go on that cruise. Every other summer we go on vacation to Kario, and always went out on a cruise."
Huffing in impatience, Darian said, "What does it really matter? We need to come up with a plan. Do either of you have any idea what we can do?"
Now Kane was the one to look thoughtful. "Well, while I was stuck in the shield–"
Darian interrupted, "You mean hiding?"
Kane waved his words away. "Stuck, hiding, technicalities—anyway, after I had made a strategic retreat to safety, I did some thinking. I think that, since the good Captain suggested we need to do some growing up, maybe he would be open to, I don't know, getting us a guide and letting us explore this country. If we for some reason do not find our Shadow Walker and have to return in shame to get further instructions, at least we will have gotten some education out of the situation. We have plenty of funds; we have what, four embassies in this country? If we start out at this port, we could work our way east and check in at an embassy once a month. Do you think he will go for it?"
Patro and Darian both looked thoughtful for a moment. Kane usually had pretty sound ideas, so the two did not see any immediate flaws with the plan. After discussing it a little longer, Kane proposed they pitch the idea to the Captain. When Darian offered to be the one to approach the Captain, both Patro and Kane shouted him down. After a heated discussion, the young men decided the best person to approach the Captain would be Kane.
As he was leaving their common room, Darian shouted out to him, "Remember—it will be an educational experience for us."
Kane just waved back to him, "Yeah, yeah, I remember."
Chapter Six
When Kane reached topside again, he could clearly see the land in the distance. The city they were heading for looked huge, stretching even further out than their home port of Decca. If he remembered correctly, they would be tying up at the Port of Cartan, and Cartan was one of the places they had an embassy. His idea may just work. They had people in the embassy who would be able to, maybe, provide an escort and keep them out of trouble. These people were trained to navigate the sticky political situations that could arise between the two countries, so they should have no problem keeping up with the Lyra. In fact, Kane thought, they would probably be happy to get in good with the future leaders of the race. This was going to be an excellent idea.
***
"That is an idiotic idea! Completely idiotic—is this one of Darian's ideas? This screams that little hot head all over it." Captain Iscra was pacing the floor, attempting to reason with Kane.
"Well, no sir—it actually, umm—I came up with the idea. I thought we could see the country we will one day have to negotiate with… learn some of their culture, and get a bit of experience with the world."
"By yourselves? You want me to turn you loose in another country by yourselves? Which part of ‘you have the mental and emotional maturity of one of their twelve-year-olds’ did you miss?"
"Oh no, not by ourselves; Darian would have us killed in a matter of days. No, I thought that maybe, that is if you would, could you find us an escort at the embassy? One of our own people to lead us? And maybe keep it a secret that we screwed up? We talked about it and thought maybe, uh, well, we could sort of act as thought this trip was always meant to be a cultural learning experience." Kane was losing hope that the Captain would find his idea a good one.
"A cultural learning experience? A poorly planned one, where you have no guide? Well, you are twenty-five, no one really expects mature decisions from someone so young. Although, I will tell you that twenty-five-year-olds in this country are usually married, settled with a child or two, and have been working for many years. You will need a keeper to keep you out of trouble." Sighing heavily, Iscra finally finished, "I will go to the embassy myself tomorrow after I arrange a trade meeting. I will ask who we have available, if we have anyone. Then I will try to arrange an escort, a keeper for the three of you. But you have to promise to keep your tempers under control—you and Darian. I would be ashamed for word of how the three of you have acted to reach back home. The crew on this ship—well, they are your crew, bonded to this ship by their blood. They cannot hurt you and yours without consequences, but strangers…" Sighing heavily again, "This may turn out to be a very bad idea. If it wasn't for Darian's black hair with the fire red tips, you could almost pass for a regular Deyarian. But that hair screams Fire Walker to anyone who sees him."
"Captain, if that is the only problem, then maybe we could buy him a wig to cover it up?" Kane asked doubtfully.
"A wig, son, no wig will hide what he is. The minute he gets emotional about anything, those green eyes will start to glow. Green, not blue like the rest of our race, but green. A brilliant emerald green that Lyriants have probably never seen before. They are used to our pale blue eyes, but most of them will have never seen a green-eyed person before in their life."
"What color are their eyes?"
"Hmm? Oh, they have brown eyes, ranging from light to so dark they look black. Head back down below, and tell the other two I will see about arranging something tomorrow. We will also have to arrange to come back and pick you up. That is, if I can find someone brave enough to babysit the three of you."
Chapter Seven
"Stop pacing Darian, just stop. Captain Iscra said he would see if he could arrange something after he arranges his trade meeting. We don't know how far it is to the embassy from the port area—it could be late before he gets back, and you are annoying me." Kane finally told Darian.
Darian stopped pacing and threw himself down in a chair and started tapping his fingers on the chair arm. "I know, but what if he can't find anyone? We will have to go home in disgrace."
Kane jumped up and started pacing, "I really think he wants us to succeed in this, so I am sure he will do the best he can to find someone."
"After dealing with both of you for five weeks, I think he just wants a break from us; if he does find someone he will be relieved to get rid of the two of you. He does not know how important this is to us. How can he? No, mark my words, he does not want to spend five weeks with us on the return trip, then five more weeks bringing us back, and then five more weeks with us. I don't blame him. The two of you will probably turn the man into a drunk if he has to cart us back and forth for the next few months. Not to mention that he would have to do two trading trips back to back, and he is not prepared to do that just yet."
Kane looked at Patro. "Why wouldn't he be prepared? He is a trade captain—all he did was trade the ship he was on for our ship."
Patro glanced over at
Kane, then back to the notes he was trying to write, " One day, I talked to him about why he gave up his ship for this one, and what he planned to do with this one. He still owns his old ship, you know. He just hired a new captain for it, and it still runs his old trade route. He has not set up a regular trading schedule for this one yet. He couldn't with our twenty-fifth birthday approaching, and he knew we would need to come to this country around that time. After this trip, though, he expects to be able to set up something more regular. After all, if this ship does not move, it makes us no money."
Kane, curious, now had to ask, "So why did he give up his ship for this one?"
Patro shrugged, "He said there was not a captain alive who would not trade their first born to be the captain of a Ship of the Line. I am not sure if he was serious or not, though. He also said we would not understand until we were older."
"But he does intend to set up a trade route, right? I mean, ultimately that is why this ship was built, wasn't it?" Darian eased into the conversation.
Patro shrugged again, "Actually, according to the Captain, it was built as one of the four trade ships our Lyra will eventually own, but the timing of it was to travel to Lyriant. Did you ever wonder why the cruises we use to take every other summer never went far, and never outside the shield? I did. I mentioned it to the Captain during the same conversation. He just brushed it off and said they probably had a set route."
Kane looked at him, "But you don't think so after he said no captain would carry us, do you?"
"Honestly, no, I think there is more to this ship than they have told us." Patro looked up at the ceiling, "Did you just hear someone call us?"
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