“You’ll be no good to anyone with a spring fever,” said Farran, when Fox got particularly upset at their constant delays on the fifth day. “You and your father are both traversing the same road. We’ll find him, I promise.”
“What if something happens?” said Fox. The group was settled beneath a wide bridge, keeping mostly dry from the rapidly thickening rainfall. Not far away, Topper and Wick were playing cards on a flat rock. They had long since given up on trying to invite Fox to join in the game when he was in such a mood. “What if they change course and we can’t adjust to catch up in time? What if this mess keeps us stuck here, and they keep moving through it?”
Farran didn’t answer, instead pretending to pick dust from his fabric merchant’s cloak.
“What if he doesn’t believe me?” said Fox, almost timidly.
“Ah, there it is,” said Farran. “I knew we’d get around to the real reason for your attitude one of these days.”
Fox didn’t bother to argue. He stared moodily out at the rain, half convinced that it was torturing him on purpose. “I’ve gone over and over it in my head,” said Fox. “And I’m sure I can convince him. But then I remember the way he looked at me before he left, and I wonder ...
Will he still just see a silly little boy who wouldn’t listen to his father?”
“I wouldn’t put so little faith in him,” said Farran. “And besides, don’t forget who you’re traveling with. You’re not the only one with tricks up your sleeves.” He grabbed Fox by the shoulder and steered him over to join Wick and Topper. “Now, enough moping around. You travel like a man, you play like a man. Deal him in, boys!”
The rain didn’t clear until early evening, leaving them just enough time to make it to a tiny little orchard village and rent a room for the night. But from that day on, Fox stopped brooding about the rain. He stopped worrying about how long it would take to reach Father, and instead began worrying very much about what he would say when he got there.
✽ ✽ ✽
There was a comfortable sort of routine about traveling. Each morning, the group rose before dawn to practice combat and knife-throwing. It had started out as Farran and Fox simply carrying on their normal patterns, but Wick had soon joined them, and Topper hadn’t wanted to be left out. And if either of the Doffers wondered how a dandy fabric merchant knew so much about fighting, they kept it to themselves.
They traveled with the morning mist, taking to the road just as the sun began to warm the spring grass. A fine dew would cling to their clothes and skin, and a light haze thickened the air. And, more often than not, they were not alone on this early morning road. The farther they traveled along the Merchant’s Highway, the more crowded the path became. Caravans from all over the Central Kingdoms were traversing the highway, filling the air with unfamiliar scents and languages. Tents and wagon camps sprang up along the side of the road each night, and a tentative sort of camaraderie developed between those groups that found themselves traveling together by accident.
In between towns and cities, the highway was home. And it might have been a dangerous and lonely road. But instead, the spaces between became one long, winding campground. Two or three caravans would share campfires, and music could often be heard from some of them. Everyone more or less spoke “The Marked Speech,” or “Trader’s Tongue,” the common language among waresmen and merchants that allowed them to communicate wherever they went. Fox himself had been trained to speak it from the cradle, though it was unnecessary in a valley where everyone spoke the same language. But here, he found the words rolled off his tongue as easily as though he’d never spoken anything else.
“It’s not a trader’s gift,” said Farran one night, as they shared a spice trader’s fire. Not far off, one of the waresmen was trying to teach Wick and Topper some of their words, and the Doffians were laughing even as they struggled. Their mountain home was routinely visited by other Sovestans, but their community as a whole rarely ventured outside the Highborns. They never had a need to learn something as complex as Marked Speech. But the companies on the road were more than willing to try and communicate with them either way, and Topper especially was catching on rather quickly.
“Sorry?” said Fox, torn away from his dinner by Farran’s comment.
“Your gift with speech,” said Farran. “It’s not a natural trader’s talent, if that’s what you were thinking.”
“I may have been,” said Fox, shrugging. He knew the god far too well by now to wonder at these occasional insights to his thoughts. “It just made sense, didn’t it? Father was always good at it, he’s the one who taught me. Thought it might run in the family.”
“Your father was good at it because he practiced,” said Farran. “Because he had to be. But you pick up new words and speech much quicker than that. Even on the road, haven’t you noticed how more of the signs make sense to you? You understand more in every passing market than in the one before.”
Fox had noticed, in a way, although he hadn’t given much thought to it. He assumed it was something in every trader’s blood: an instinct, just as natural as tracking or reading a stranger’s body language. “If it’s not a trapper or a trader’s mark,” said Fox after a moment, “then —”
“The Shavid travel all across the Known World,” said Farran, “and even beyond at times. They’ve got to be quick, picking up customs and languages and words. There are places where one wrong step could get you hanged, and the Shavid set foot in all of them.”
They sat in silence, watching as Topper fumbled over a complicated set of numbers in Marked Speech, while this newfound facet of Fox’s Blessing sank in. Finally, Fox asked, “How fast?”
“Hmm?”
“How fast can I learn?”
Farran chuckled and winked knowingly. “That, my dear boy, is entirely up to you.”
As they settled in that night, Fox looked around at the lights dancing up and down the streets, and this wandering community he’d found himself a part of. How were they any different from the Shavid? Perhaps the two cultures were not as dissimilar as he’d once believed. But then, at the end of the road, these traders had a place to call home. And Fox wondered if the Shavid ever settled down one place long enough to think of it as home.
Restless, he tossed and turned long into the night, into the hours where light snores and the soft hiss of dying fires were all that could be heard, and even the animals seemed to be asleep or hiding. Finally, he sat up and scooted closer to the remains of their campfire, where Farran was sitting up as he always did.
“It’s a beautiful night,” said Farran softly. “We’ve been lucky with the weather of late.”
Fox grunted in agreement, following Farran’s gaze up to the cloudless sky and the stunningly bright blanket of stars flung across it. He sat there for a moment by the god’s side, watching the stars winking in their secret language from above. Then he said casually, “Couldn’t sleep, despite the beautiful night and lucky weather.”
“Oh?”
“And I thought, maybe a story might help me sleep?”
Farran’s answering laugh was so soft, the man sleeping three feet away couldn’t have heard it, even had he been awake. “Such a child sometimes,” he joked. “A bedtime story to scare the nightmares away?”
“Pity you can’t see my face,” answered Fox dryly. “Then you’d realize that no one else thinks you’re funny, and what a shame that would be.”
“Ah,” said Farran fondly, placing two fingers on their familiar perch between Fox’s eyes, “but she thought I was funny. And hers was the only laughter in the world I ever needed.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
The Chancellor’s Daughter
Two weeks at sea had brought them to landfall in the city of Aseos. And within only two days in port, the pirates had made their presence known in every brothel and drinking house in the city. Farran and Edwin had even joined them that first evening, drinking away the memories of Captain Worthright’s death in a little pub just off the docks.
But come sunrise, it was all business. The two left their gallivanting crew to enjoy their shore leave, and turned their own attentions to matters of profit rather than pleasure. There were goods to sell, and repairs to be made. And, before a scrap of work could be done on either ship, they had to agree on the fates of the naval prisoners kept under constant watch in the hold of the Laila.
“Fish bait, every one of them,” said Edwin bitterly as the two ambled up the gangplank. The handful of pirates left aboard the Laila tipped their hats or bobbed their heads by way of a casual salute. “Chop them up and throw them to the bilge rats. Or the sharks, if you’d prefer it.”
For two weeks, Farran had heard his men saying much the same thing, along with suggesting other, more colorful means of torture. But Farran had always insisted that the prisoners be treated with an aloof sort of respect. And now, he told Edwin what he’d been telling the men for a fortnight. “These are the King’s own officers, and they are gentlemen. Treat them as such, and they will respond much better.”
Edwin snorted. “No king I’m beholden to. To me, they’re nothing but men. Lower than men, in fact.”
Farran turned a knavish grin on Edwin as they descended into the hold. “Aye, sir,” he said. “Lower than men. But the humblest earthen stone can be a tool.” And with that, he strode purposefully down in to the heart of the ship with Edwin in his wake, to where a single man stood guard over more than forty barred and shackled prisoners.
“Right then!” shouted Farran, rousing the naval officers from their vague stupors. Some of them glared mutinously at him, others that were no more than boys seemed terrified to the very core. But all eyes were on Farran as he continued. “You lot have two choices! First, you forfeit your freedoms as men and allow yourselves to be indentured sailors aboard one of our fine ships. You’ll work like dogs for the barest wages until such time, if any, that we see fit to release you. Elsewise, I let this gentleman here,” and he gestured to Edwin, who stood with his arms crossed in an almost eerie shadow of Captain Worthright’s favorite stance, “tear you limb from limb with his bare hands. And I might add that your captain was responsible for the murder of his father, so I wouldn’t test his anger, lads.”
Farran let these choices sink in for a moment, but a moment was all it took. There was a desperate clamoring within the cell as men scrambled to offer themselves up as slaves, and Farran winked at Edwin. The two left the man on guard with parchment and charcoal pen, charged with taking down the names of each sailor who volunteered. And with that, Farran and Edwin climbed back out on deck, both laughing heartily at the panic they had caused below.
✽ ✽ ✽
They auctioned off the two smaller commandeered naval ships, even managing to drive up the price by promising to include a handful of able-bodied, indentured men with each. Edwin and Farran would each take their pick from among the sailors in the brig, and leave the rest to new captains and strange horizons. And, as Farran constantly reminded Edwin, none of them had handled the sword that killed his father. They were not the enemy.
There was only one man who refused to join with the pirates. A sailor who stood staunchly at the back of the hold, adamantly declaring that he would rather die a loyal servant than live a traitor to his crown. The man was taken aboard the Merry Doll, and Farran left Edwin to do as he would. The man’s dying screams could be heard across the dock, and when Edwin emerged, no questions were asked.
The plundered goods were sold off bit by bit, scattered between the black market and those sorts of nobles who didn’t give a second thought to where their goods came from. By week’s end, each pirate had a hefty bonus weighing down his pockets, along with the promise that they would not set sail again for at least a week. The indentured prisoners were divided between the Laila and the Merry Doll, or else sent with the auctioned vessels. And then, with business done, Edwin and Farran were happy to join the men in their revels. They drank and sang the nights away. And it was in these hours, tucked between the starlit darkness and the sun’s waking breaths, that Edwin seemed himself again. A laughing, somewhat shy young man, much beloved by the men. Almost a younger brother to many of them, and happy to let himself be picked on and laughed at.
But it was only in these moments. Only when the song and companionship could begin to drive away the memories of his recent tragedy. And then, the sun brought its harsh glare to rest upon the city, and Edwin was the captain once more. Untried and unsure. Inexperienced and isolated. Edwin Farthington lived and laughed in the night. But he was Captain Worthright when the sun rose. And Farran, watching his young friend struggle to find his footing, couldn’t quite be sure which man the pirates needed most.
✽ ✽ ✽
Shore leave always made Farran restless. While it was a beautiful privilege to be able to wander strange roads and discover new places, even for a god, it wasn’t where he belonged.
Even a place such as Aseos. It was a beautiful puzzle of a city, tucked on the edge of a mysterious land of bamboo forests and paper lanterns: Vathidel. The gem of the Gossamer Sea. Farran had wandered its roads and rivers countless times, and was always eager to be back. Still, the ocean called to him like a chorus of sirens, in voices only he could hear. Its discordant song crept into his dreams whenever he bothered to sleep, and whispered in his ear like a lady of the night. Beckoning him back, lovingly and desperately purring in his very heart.
Farran began to forsake his men in their evening pleasures, choosing instead to wander the moonlit beaches or pace up and down the water-worn docks. And, in the moments when the songs tore at him in a way he simply could not resist, he would take a swim. He would throw himself from the figurehead of the Laila, enjoying one brief moment of sharp wind on his face as he plunged downward, before he disappeared beneath the water’s surface.
Tonight, he emerged from his swim covered in seaweed , starfish and barnacles clinging to his hair and clothes as the ocean tried to entice him to stay. But Farran stepped out onto the shore, and the bits of sea that had followed him fell with soft thumps into the sand, letting themselves be washed away by the drifting tide. Farran himself collapsed onto the powdery grains, caring not a stitch for the ocean waves lapping at his boots like an old dog seeking attention. He ran his fingers through his hair, drying it instantly as only a god might.
And he sat, listening to the waves and watching the skies grow steadily lighter as dawn approached. His restlessness had subsided somewhat, dampened by his swim. He watched the black, skeletal silhouettes of the ships in the harbor, and could hear the gentle creak of wooden beams even from a distance.
It would have been so simple to head out to sea again by himself, leaving Aseos and his men behind. He’d done it before, in different lands and with different crews. He was a god, after all, and not bound to the same rules as men. He had the power to disappear, to sail off alone and seek grander adventures that men could only imagine. But as he listened to the distant sounds of a city beginning to wake, Farran knew he wouldn’t be going anywhere. This crew was the finest he’d ever sailed with, and Edwin was one of the most decent mortal men Farran had ever met. A friend, even. If the pirate god was content to sail the world as a man for a time, these were the sea dogs to do it with.
Besides, he thought as he stretched himself out lazily, every god drew some of their power from their worshipers. And what better way to be steeped in power than to surround himself by the very men who paid tribute to him? He closed his eyes, letting the rising sun bathe him in warm light and paint the sand a brilliant orange. They would be out to sea again soon enough, and until then he could wait.
And then, Farran heard it. A dull, pounding beat making the sand beneath his head quiver and throb. He sat up, scanning the horizon, his every muscle taut and expectant. One hand was already on his sword, his other whipping a hidden blade from his vest. Somewhere down the beach, a shadow drew nearer. A black shape thundering down the shore, throwing up sand and ocean spray in its wake.
A horse.
Black as night, and bearing a rider wrapped in such dark robes that they might have been the steed’s own mane. As horse and rider galloped closer, Farran could see that the horse did not wear a saddle. And there was a laugh. A wild, unburdened hollering from its rider.
A woman’s laugh. Farran sat up even straighter, watching as the woman came ever closer.
Behind her, struggling to catch up on his own yellow steed, was a round and anxious-looking man. “My lady!” he called. “Please, your decorum! Wait!”
But instead of heeding him, the woman bent even nearer to her horse’s neck and put on a burst of speed. Again she laughed, and for the briefest moment, the sound rang in Farran’s ears even louder than the ocean’s call. Horse and rider roared down the coastline, their path an arrow-straight line to where Farran lay.
An ordinary man might have moved out of the way. But Farran simply leaned himself back on his elbows and waited. And, at the last moment, the horse leaped, clearing Farran as easily as though he were a sandbanked scrap of driftwood.
The woman reined her animal to a slow trot and turned it around, clicking gently in its ear as she pulled it to a stop at Farran’s side. And then she sat up straight. Her hood fell away, and Farran could see her face.
He had walked the worlds and the places between for a hundred lifetimes of men. He had danced with beautifully dangerous women and dined with the goddess of love. He had swum alongside sirens so lovely then men leapt into storm-tossed waters just to be with them, and he himself had let his heart wander with more than a few mortal women. But Farran had never seen someone, be it goddess, monster, or mortal, as beautiful as this woman.
Her hair was black as the hood that now hung roughly from her shoulders. Her skin might have been the exquisitely polished mango wood of a figurehead, and carved by a craftsman so skilled that he ought to have built ships for Spirit’s own armies. And her eyes ... The whole world of shipwrecked treasures in the ocean’s heart did not hold a gem so pure, nor a color so deep. It was as though the richest of greens and the most dazzling golden-blues had joined in secret, to create a brand new color just for this woman’s eyes.
Windswept (The Mapweaver Chronicles Book 1) Page 34