by J. M. Lee
“Well, now what?” Kylan asked.
Amri looked down the dock toward the beach, where more and more fires appeared as the sky grew darker. Despite the orange and red flames, in his heart he knew none were the fires of resistance Aughra had spoken of. Still, he longed to be on solid land instead of the sea.
“Let’s go to the beach,” he suggested, hoping his real reasons for wanting to avoid the ship weren’t obvious. “After all, we didn’t come all the way here to sit it out on a boat while the princess does all the adventuring . . .”
Kylan tilted his head. “The beach? Why?”
Amri gestured, away from the Omerya and Onica’s ship. “I think we should do what all good Gelfling do when something strange is afoot in a strange land. Seek answers.”
Naia grinned in agreement. Apparently she wasn’t eager to retire to the ship, either.
“Great,” she said, leading the way. “Let’s find ourselves some trouble.”
CHAPTER 8
A light rain fell as they arrived at the beach, but the wide-leafed palms that grew in clusters out of the sandy earth protected them from the sprinkles. The air tasted salty with fish, and Amri’s stomach growled. Naia must have heard it, or had her own talking belly, and said, “I’ll get some food. Meet up over at the fire in a bit!”
After she was gone, Amri took in the stretch of white-and-coral sand, glittering in the light of the bonfires lit along the shore. The Claw Mountains, tall and red, blocked out the last remains of the sunlight with their pointed backs, giving Amri’s eyes relief as night’s tide washed over the land.
“Whew, it gets dark fast out here,” Kylan remarked.
The two of them followed Naia down the dock at a more leisurely pace. Amri’s ears perked up as he traced the lines of the headlands. Smooth, round openings riddled the rocky rises where they stretched out into the bay. Caves carved by the endless ebb and flow of the ocean, glowing dimly with bio-fluorescent life. Amri wondered what kinds of treasures might have been caught in the eddies and tide pools. Things lost overboard or from shipwrecks. Maybe even relics washed from across the Silver Sea, where no Gelfling had ever set foot.
“Hey, do you want to go check out the headland caves?” he asked, pointing.
Kylan followed Amri’s finger, eyes unfocused. Amri frowned. All the song teller saw was darkness.
“I’d rather go sit by the fire,” he said. “I don’t really like . . . caves.”
Caves. When Kylan said it like that, hesitant and fearful, Amri sucked in his disappointment.
“Oh, okay. Let’s go, then!” he said, forcing some cheer and standing up straight. He didn’t even look back over his shoulder as Kylan nodded in relief and led the way into the light of the bonfires on the beach. They found a place to sit and wait for Naia, and Amri tried not to squint in the light of the booming, crackling fire.
“Are you all right?” Kylan asked.
“Yep. I’m fine. Hungry. Hope Naia gets here soon.”
Kylan glanced his way, then out into the dark, lips pressed into a line. Then he sighed and shook his head. “I’m sorry, Amri. I didn’t realize. The light must be hard on your eyes . . . and here we’ve all been traveling during the day and sleeping at night. Why didn’t you say something?”
Amri flushed. It was hard to get used to something difficult when someone else showed sympathy for the first time. There was some confidence in being alone with the problem; he could pretend it didn’t matter if no one else noticed. He almost wished Kylan hadn’t said anything, though at the same time his heart filled knowing the song teller had noticed.
“It’s fine,” he said again. “I’m adjusting . . . Don’t tell Naia. I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Amri! You’re not a—”
“Hey, guys. Look what I brought!”
Naia joined them, three splints of food in hand. Fish for her and Amri and a squash for Kylan. The splints were long enough for them to roast their food in the fire. Amri gave Kylan a gentle warning glance, and that was the end of it.
The three of them settled in with their supper. A Sifa group nearby scooted closer to the fire and took turns throwing handfuls of powders into the fire. The flames faded through jewel colors as the different spices ignited. The Sifa youth murmured in awe at the colors until one of them threw something in that caused a ball of white flame to spring from the fire, like a bubble in deep water.
The beachside quieted as the Gelfling watched the white fire dissipating into the night sky. The bright light of the fire against the dark of the night reminded Amri of their shared vision. He couldn’t begin to understand what it had all meant, yet it had delivered them here.
The quiet brought Amri a wave of homesickness. Out under the open sky where he’d always dreamed of going, sitting on the beach while the ocean lapped at the bay. So far from Domrak and the Caves of Grot, and the Sanctuary where his clan kept watch over the remains of the place they’d promised to protect.
“Tell us a song, Kylan?” he asked. At first he thought maybe he’d embarrassed the song teller, but Kylan responded without hesitation.
“I’d love to,” Kylan said, eager to make up for what he’d said and hadn’t said before. “What song would you like to hear?”
“Do you know the song of the Three Sisters?”
Kylan withdrew his lute from their shared traveling pack. “Is that one of Gyr’s? Was it written in Domrak on the walls?”
“Yes! It’s about Gyr, and how one day, he was traveling. Or I guess it would have been night. Anyway, he found them crying. The two sisters. About the suns. I guess it would have been the brothers. No wait, it had to be day, not night, because . . .”
Amri stopped talking when he heard what he was saying. Naia laughed.
“Song-telling really isn’t your strong suit, is it?”
“That’s why I’m not Amri the Song Teller—come on, Kylan. You know the one, don’t you?” Amri let loose a big grin. He reached out and shook Kylan by the sleeve. Even the song teller had a funny look on his face, trying not to laugh at Amri.
“Yes, I think I know the one you mean now,” he said. He strummed the six strings of his instrument, tuning it by ear as he chuckled. The sound of the lute caught the attention of the Sifa nearby. Amri ignored them. This song was for him, and he would soak up every word of it.
Kylan cleared his throat and sang:
Gyr was a bard that traveled the seas
Oh li, oh la, oh lo
Told the songs of the rivers, the mountains, the trees
Oh li, oh la, la-lo
One long summer ago, the night stopped to come
The Sister Moons hiding, in fear of the suns
The daylight was endless, scorching the plains
So Gyr went to find them and bring night again
He found two of the moons at the edge of the sky
A lake at their feet from the tears they had cried
“The Brother Suns’ fire for us is too bright
While they rage in the sky we cannot bring the night
So we Sisters take turns going first into dawn
To spy on the Brothers to see if they’ve gone
’Twas our second Sister Moon’s turn to go
Oh li, oh la, oh lo
But the second Brother Sun ate her whole
Oh li, oh la, la-lo."
The moons were too fearful since their Sister’s sad fate
To bring night to the sky, to bring nine to the eight
So Gyr left them to watch the Brother Suns from the land
He returned three days later and told them his plan
The remaining two Sisters scaled the edge of the sky
Their fingertips wet from the tears that they’d cried
From their lips came a song: a mournful, sad sigh
And from the belly
of the sun came a lonely reply
For the second Sister was still alive
Oh, the second Sister was still alive
To this day, though she’s hidden by Brother Sun’s light
Oh li, oh la, oh lo
Her song tells her Sisters to bring out the night
Oh she, oh sha, she knows
To bring out the night
Oh she, oh sha, she knows
Amri and Naia clapped and whistled when the song ended. As they did, they were joined, slowly, by the cheers of the Sifa around them. Kylan’s song had enraptured nearly everyone on the beach. Amri waved at Kylan to stand, and when he did and gave a little awkward bow, the cooling evening seemed a little warmer.
It was not to last. A commotion at the far end of the beach, where the sand met the dock, sucked the spirit from the air. The cheers turned to whispers as the Sifa stood, turning back toward the dock. Amri and his friends stood with them, the last notes of Kylan’s lute dissipating as he slipped it hastily into his pack.
“What’s going on?” Amri said.
Sifa gathered, murmuring, one chanting and waving his hands in sigils of protection over and over in the air. Naia pushed into the crowd and Amri followed quickly after her, Kylan on his heels. When they broke through the throng of sailors, Amri stumbled to a halt.
Tae stood at the edge of the docks, barely lit by one of the torches. Her posture was off balance, slightly tipped to one side. She gazed straight ahead, unblinking.
“What,” Naia gasped. “What’s wrong with her?”
She shouldered her way free from the crowd, the only one brave enough to approach the ghostly Sifa, who stood, unmoving, one foot in the sand and the other on the dock. She wobbled when Naia touched her shoulders, then caught her when her legs came out from under her. Someone in the crowd screamed. Amri helped lower Tae to the sand.
“A healer! Someone find a healer!”
“Where’s Maudra Ethri? Fetch her!”
Naia knelt over Tae, pressing a hand against her cheek.
“She’s cold as ice,” Naia said. She was pale herself, out of fear. Though Amri had never seen it himself, he knew what she was thinking. The drained look, the soulless, open-eyed gaze.
“How is this possible?” Kylan hissed. “How can it have happened so far from the castle?”
The crowd came in, a thickening wall of voices and eyes. One of the Sifa captains pushed to the front of the line. He swept back his coat to make sure they saw the blade hanging at his belt. Like the captain Staya, he didn’t appear to be a full-blooded Sifa, though from his thick black hair, Amri wondered if his ancestors had hailed from Stone-in-the-Wood instead of the Swamp of Sog.
“You, Drenchen! Spriton!” he called. “Who are you? Get away from Tae.”
“I’m a healer, that’s what I am,” Naia shot back.
“Oh? Do you know what’s happened to her?”
“Looks like poisoning,” said someone.
“Her earrings are missing!” cried another.
Naia gently turned Tae’s head to the side, where it fell without resistance. The jewels they’d so recently seen strung along her ears were gone.
“There’s a thief, then, eh!” said the captain with the sword. He turned and glowered at Kylan, then caught sight of Amri and leaned in. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you? Say we search your pockets. We going to find Tae’s pretties in there?”
“Absolutely not,” Amri snapped. “I was over by the bonfire when she came here!”
The angry captain stood tall, casting about. “Anyone see this little Shadowling by the bonfire like he says?”
“I did!” Naia yelled. She shoved the captain aside. He was older, but not much bigger than she was. “All three of us were all the way across the beach. Kylan told a song and everyone heard it. Isn’t that right?”
Amri looked over the crowd. Though he saw dozens of familiar faces, ones that had smiled and cheered at Kylan’s song, none of them stood up to defend him. Amri wanted to sink into the earth, but Naia wasn’t so quick to be discouraged. She ignored the silent bystanders, fixing her attention back on the Sifa captain.
“I’m a healer,” Naia said. “Back off and let me help her.”
“I’m not letting you anywhere near Tae!”
Naia held her ground, but even she was unprepared as the hollering around them intensified. The firelight grew brighter as others brought torches. Amri caught Naia’s eyes in the commotion. Though they were surrounded, she wasn’t afraid, and she had the angry captain’s attention. Everyone jumped back when he drew his blade.
“What’s going on here?”
Maudra Ethri stormed like thunder down the dock. The shouting ceased and the crowd backed down, spilling away from Amri, his friends, and Tae like a school of fish parting around a predator. Ethri glared at Naia first, then fixed her gaze on the angry captain waving his sword around.
“Put that blade away, Madso.”
He did as she said, then he jabbed with a finger instead. “They poisoned Tae and robbed her blind! Look at her!”
“What is this?” Ethri asked lowly. “What’s happened to her?”
“I think she’s been drained,” Naia said. “I don’t know how.”
Drained.
The word erupted through the Sifa like fire on oil. Ethri stood, back to the Omerya, casting an eye on each of the Sifa as if daring them to keep saying the horrible word.
Drained? Like in the pink-petal dream? But that means . . . How?
“That’s impossible. If we’re to believe the rumors of the petals, the draining is done far away. At the castle, with the Crystal!”
As Maudra Ethri knelt to examine Tae, Amri felt a familiar prickling on his neck. Tavra had gotten all the way up to his shoulder in the commotion.
“Be ready with that sword,” she whispered in Amri’s ear, voice hot like steam rushing through cracks in the center of the earth. “Maudra Ethri’s guest—”
His heart raced. “Ready with the sword? But—”
Amri’s Grottan eyes penetrated the night even the distance to the Omerya. At first he saw nothing but the ship’s gently undulating sails, its hull glowing with ultramarine sea life. Distracted by the spectacle on the beach, no one else noticed the huge shadow descending the gangplank, striding gracefully down the dock. Amri’s hand sweated against the sword.
“No,” he whispered.
Skeksis.
“What’s all this, Maudra Ethri?”
The murmurs snuffed out like candles at the grand, rich voice. A tall avian figure, dressed in a salt-dusted brocade coat shining with embroidered green and gold, stepped off the dock and into the torchlight of the beach. She towered over them, half in serpent-scale armor and half in a ruffled gown.
“Lord Mariner,” Maudra Ethri said, issuing a hasty bow. “I can take care of this. You didn’t have to come down here to see this commotion . . .”
“And why wouldn’t I? You are my little Gelfling, are you not?”
The Mariner doffed her black-and-green plumed hat. Beneath, her face was reptilian and blue, coiffed in a mane of black fur and streaming feathers. Amri’s hand froze on his sword, his feet buried to the ankles in sand and unwilling to move. Naia reached for her dagger, moving in front of Kylan when he fell back in surprise. Tae was the only one who did not react, blank eyes staring straight into the sky.
“And please,” the Skeksis purred, “call me Captain.”
CHAPTER 9
“Skeksis,” Amri stammered, though all that came out was a breath. “Why’s a Skeksis . . .”
The Sifa around them bowed, hushing in the presence of the Mariner. They weren’t surprised to see the Skeksis there. They’d known. They’d all known, the whole time. Maudra Ethri waved them away, even as their necks bent to the Skeksis Lord.
“Everyone, go back to your ships. Leave this to me and Lord skekSa. Go on, get out of here.”
Amri gripped the hilt of his sword as the Sifa murmured, heeding their maudra’s orders. Some threw glittering fish scales and jewels at skekSa’s feet as they left, giving her wide berth on their way back to the docks. Within moments, it was just Amri and his friends on the beach, their shadows tiny in comparison to the fearsome silhouette of the Skeksis that stood over them.
Naia was the first to turn on Ethri. “Explain yourself!”
Maudra Ethri’s fists clenched, her whole body overcome with annoyance and defensiveness. She wasn’t used to being questioned, Amri realized. That was about to change. He stood beside Naia, drawing strength from her despite how nervous he was challenging a maudra and a Skeksis.
“So this is why you turned your ear against us?” he asked. “Because it was already owned by a conniving Skeksis?”
skekSa snorted. “It’s rude to talk about a conniving Skeksis while they stand right in front of you.”
Amri tried not to buckle at the Skeksis’s deep, velvety voice. skekSa elbowed back her coat, kneeling. Where the Chamberlain’s joints had creaked with age, skekSa was limber and graceful, though up close Amri could still see the wrinkles between the metallic scales on her cheeks.
“Poor little Tae. Let us move her to somewhere more comfortable. It is unsettling to see her in a pile like this.”
She easily scooped Tae’s body up in one arm, cradling her like a youngling. Her tenderness made Amri wriggle with discomfort. He wanted to run, either at skekSa to tear Tae from her claws, or to flee the place entirely. But he couldn’t do either, not without abandoning his friends or challenging a Skeksis.
They followed skekSa to an abandoned quilt that had been laid out on the sand near the biggest fire, and skekSa gently lowered Tae to rest there. She sat on a makeshift throne of stacked logs, swinging one boot over her knee and arranging her coat and skirts. The tide was coming in, eating the sand and transforming it into ocean.
“Now, my dear Drenchen girl. Explain what has happened,” skekSa said.