“Won’t work…” the captain muttered, scratching his head with his sliver of coal.
Tylar joined him and waved the others out on the dock.
Captain Horas had to squeeze against the wall to allow Malthumalbaen to pass. His eyes tracked the giant, then back to Tylar. “He’s not going, is he?”
Tylar nodded.
“Sweet aether…” The captain scratched a line of calculations. “A dozen, that’s the most we’ll be able to ferry through the storm. If we can ferry through the storm.” He laughed, but it held no mirth. “And I need three men to crew…and that giant…that’s two men right there.”
Tylar took the charcoal from his fingers and turned the man toward the open door. “We’ll have to manage.” He gave him a push out into the freezing bite of the storm’s heart.
Outside, the others gaped at the state of the flippercraft. The woodwrights had proven their mastery. The stoved ship seemed to be patched well. Details were fairly smeared away.
Lorr held a hand over his nose. Tylar did not blame him. The reek was overpowering even in the open.
“Black bile,” Krevan said with a shake of his head.
One of the dockworkers, masked against the stench, swabbed a sodden mop over the outer planking of the ship’s bow, smearing more black bile over a thin patch. Shouts echoed. Ladders were being hauled aside.
Tylar hurried to the others.
Rogger stood with his fists on his hips. “A ship of shite…now that’s a boat fit for a regent.”
Gerrod crossed toward the group, expressionless behind his bronze armor. He was followed by a welcome figure. Delia was bundled in a heavy coat, also splattered with bile.
“You had enough humour?” Tylar asked the armored master.
“Barely. We’ve emptied all of Tashijan’s storehouses.”
“And a few privies, I’d imagine,” Rogger said.
Gerrod ignored him. “Mistress Delia has proven to be an able alchemist. She had some suggestions for heightening the Grace with tears. It will not last long, but hopefully long enough to get through the storm.”
Delia stood to the side with her arms crossed. Her eyes flitted to Kathryn and back to him, her face unreadable, smudged with bile.
Gerrod continued, “Her suggestion allowed us to thin the coating across the flippercraft, while still hopefully blocking the storm’s ability to draw Grace out of the ship’s mekanicals as you pass through it. But even bile has its limits. You will have to gain as much wind as you can before attempting to spear through the storm’s ring.”
“We’ll make it,” Tylar said. They had no other choice.
A shout by the stairway door reminded them that Argent was on his way.
“Everybody aboard,” Kathryn said.
Tylar waved them toward the open hatch. Captain Horas and two of his men had already boarded, all wearing expressions of doom. Tylar watched the others climb inside. They looked no more confident, except Rogger, who was whistling.
The last to leave, Tylar turned to Kathryn and Delia. Gerrod had already clanked off to oversee something near the stern tie-down.
The two women seemed to suddenly become aware they were alone together. Kathryn broke the spell first. “I should get below. Argent will need much calming. And we have our towers to ready.”
Delia stepped off after her. “And I should see to Laurelle and the other Hands.”
Tylar lifted an arm, to object, to offer some more intimate farewell.
But he wasn’t sure to which woman he raised his arm.
Before he could decide, the pair retreated back toward the warmth and light of the open tower door. Left out in the cold, Tylar turned toward the waiting ship. A frigid breeze swept through him. His broken finger ached, and behind the palm print on his chest, something deep inside him churned with distress.
Rogger stood at the open hatch to the flippercraft and waved him to hurry. Ducking against the wind, Tylar headed toward the ship.
He did not whistle.
Dart held tight to the belt that secured her seat as the flippercraft lifted from its docking cradle. A tremble passed underfoot and under her buttocks. The mekanicals had been set to full burn. In her belly, she felt the world fall away under her.
Pupp stood near her seat, legs wide, spiky mane sticking straight out around his face. Dart swore she could hear him whine in the back of her head, but maybe it was the mekanicals ratcheting up into higher pitches, where the normal ear could not discern but only felt in the bones.
She glanced to the porthole window beside her head, but there was nothing to see. Even the windows were coated with bile.
Across from her sat Calla, the gray-cloaked Black Flagger. Despite the ash on her face, Dart read the worry. She kept glancing to Krevan, her leader, who stood at the door to their tiny cabin braced in the opening, ready to ride out the storm on his feet. He had argued earlier to join Tylar and the captain in the forward controls, but he had been refused. Captain Horas was in no mood to argue, and Tylar supported him.
“His ship, his command,” the regent had said.
Past Krevan, another cabin stood open to the hall. Malthumalbaen filled an entire bench by himself. Brant was propped up next to him, his head hanging, asleep or despondent. The giant rested a massive hand on his shoulder. On the opposite bench, Lorr sprawled on his back, knees up, as if they were all afloat on a sunny river.
Rogger spoke beside her. “Best you blink a few times, lass. Your eyeballs will dry out if you keep staring like that.”
Dart leaned back. Her fingers remained clenched.
“We’ll get through this storm,” he assured her.
“How do you know?” She coughed to chase the tremulous keen from her words.
“We’re covered in shite. What storm god would want to snatch us from the air? Probably part the clouds themselves so we don’t smudge their snowy whiteness.”
She offered a weak smile.
“We’ll make it through,” he promised.
She took a measure of strength from his confidence, but not all her worries were buried in the storm. We’ll make it through. But what then? Though she appreciated Rogger’s company, she was all too aware of the burden he carried in his satchel. It rested beside him tied to his wrist.
The skull of the rogue god.
She had been trying her best to ignore it, to dismiss it as some cursed talisman, none of her concern. Even the others continued to avoid mentioning the more intimate history of the bones.
The rogue had a name.
Keorn.
After so many years wondering about her mother and father, dreaming her childhood fantasies, here was her reality. Her father was no faceless rogue. In one night, she had gained not just a father, but an entire lineage.
Chrism’s son.
That made her Chrism’s granddaughter.
It had been Chrism who had forged Rivenscryr and sundered the gods’ homeworld in the first War of the Gods. And now a new war was starting here on Myrillia. Ancient enmities, drowned in the naether, were rising again.
And she stood at the heart of it.
Chrism’s granddaughter.
That was enough to unsettle her, to make her want to run and keep running. But that was not the primary reason for her bone-deep unease. She had long come to accept her heritage as the progeny of rogue gods. Even this new revelation of her heritage, she could come to acknowledge. In fact, she had already unburdened her fears to Laurelle and Delia. After an initial surprise, Laurelle had readily accepted her heritage.
“It makes no difference,” Laurelle had said and hugged her to prove it.
But it had been Delia who truly helped return Dart’s footing. “It doesn’t matter,” she had said. “You are not your father, nor your grandfather. And I should know, being the daughter of Argent ser Fields. Blood does not dictate the woman. Only your own heart does. You must remember that.”
