sense! What you say cannot be true!' He lifted the bottle and for one frightening instant, Etta thought he would dash out the boy's brains with it. She saw in Wintrow's face that he feared it, too. But the lad did not flinch. He sat silently awaiting the blow, almost as if he would welcome his own death. Instead, Kennit poured brandy into his glass. A tiny wave of it slopped over the edge of his glass onto the white tablecloth. The pirate ignored it. He lifted the glass and downed it at a gulp.
His anger is too great, Etta suddenly thought to herself. There is something else here, something even deeper and more painful than Vivacia's loss.
Wintrow took a ragged breath. 'I can only tell you what I believe, sir. If it were not true, I do not think Vivacia would have believed it so deeply that she died. Some part of her always knew. A dragon has always slept within her. Our brush with the serpent awakened it. The dragon was furious to discover what it had become. When I was unconscious, it demanded of me that I help it share the ship's life. I…' The boy hesitated. He left something unsaid when he went on. 'The dragon woke me today. She woke me and she forced me into full contact with Vivacia. I had held myself back from her, for I did not want her to realize what I knew, that she had never truly been alive. She was the dead shell of a forgotten dragon that my family had somehow bent to their own purposes.'
Kennit took in a sharp breath through his nose. He leaned back in his chair and held up a commanding hand that halted the boy's words. 'And that is the secret of the liveships?' he scoffed. 'It can't be. Anyone who has ever known a liveship would refuse such mad words. A dragon inside her! A ship made of dragon skin. You're addled, boy. Your illness has cooked your brain.'
But Etta believed it. The ship's presence had jangled against her nerves ever since she had first come aboard. Now it made sense. Like the strings of a musical instrument brought into true, the theory was in harmony with her feelings. It was true. There had always been a dragon inside Vivacia.
Moreover, Kennit knew it. Etta had seen the man lie before; she had heard him lie to her. Never before had she seen him lie to himself. He was not very good at it. It showed in the minute shaking of his hand as he poured himself yet another jot of brandy.
As he returned his glass to the table, he announced abruptly, 'For what I must do, I need a liveship. I have to bring her back to life.'
'I don't think you can,' Wintrow said softly.
Kennit snorted at him. 'So swiftly you lose your faith in me. Was it only a few days ago that you believed I was Chosen of Sa? Only a few weeks ago that you spoke out for me to all the people, saying I was destined to be king for them, if they could be worthy of me? Ha! Such a tiny, brittle faith, to snap at the first test. Listen to me, Wintrow Vestrit. I have walked the shores of the Others' Island, and their soothsaying has confirmed my destiny. I have calmed a storm with a word. I have commanded a sea serpent and it bent its will to mine. Only a day ago, I called you back from the very door of death, you ungrateful wretch! Now you sit there and scoff at me. You say that I cannot restore my own ship to life! How dare you? Do you seek to undermine my reign? Would the one I have treated as a son lift a scorpion's sting to me now?'
Etta remained where she stood, outside the circle of the lantern above the table and watched the two men. A cavalcade of emotions trailed across Wintrow's face. It awed her that she could read them so clearly. When had she let her guard down so far as to know another so well? Worse, she suddenly hurt for him. He, like her, was caught between love for the man they had followed so long and fear for the powerful being he was becoming. She held her breath, hoping Wintrow could find the right words. Do not anger him, she pleaded silently. Once you anger him, he will not hear you.
Wintrow drew a deep breath. Tears stood in his eyes. 'In truth, you have treated me better than my own father ever did. When you came aboard Vivacia, I expected death at your hands. Instead you have challenged me, every day, to find my life and live it. Kennit: you are more than captain to me. I do believe, without question, that you are a tool of Sa, for the working of his will. We all are, of course, but I think he has reserved for you a destiny larger than most. Nevertheless, when you speak of calling Vivacia back to life… I do not doubt you, my captain. Rather I doubt that she was ever truly alive, in the sense that you and I are. Vivacia was a fabrication, a creature composed of the memories of my forebears. The dragon was once real. But if Vivacia was never real, and the dragon died in her creation, who remains for you to call back to life?'
Briefer than the flick of a serpent's tongue, uncertainty flashed over Kennit's face. Had Wintrow seen it?
The young man remained still. His question still hung in the air between them. In disbelief, Etta watched his hand lift slightly from the table. Very slowly, he began to reach across the table, as if he would touch Kennit's own hand, in-what? Sympathy? Oh, Wintrow, do not err so badly as that!
If Kennit noticed that hovering hand, he gave no sign of it. Wintrow's words seemed not to have moved him at all. He eyed the boy and Etta clearly saw him reach some decision. Slowly he lifted the brandy bottle and poured yet another shot into his own glass. Then he reached across the table and seized Wintrow's empty glass. He sloshed a generous measure of brandy into it and set it back down before him. 'Drink that,' he commanded him brusquely. 'Perhaps it will put a bit of fire in your blood. Then do not tell me that I cannot do this thing. Instead, tell me how you will help me.' He raised his own glass and tossed it down. 'For she was alive, Wintrow. We all know that. So whatever it was that animated her, that is what we will call back.'
Wintrow's hand went slowly to the glass. He lifted it, then set it down again. 'What if that life no longer exists to call back, sir? What if she is simply gone?'
Kennit laughed, and it chilled Etta. So might a man laugh under torture, when screams were no longer sufficient for his pain. 'You doubt me, Wintrow. That is because you do not know what I know. This is not the first liveship I have ever known. They do not die so easily. That, I promise you. Now drink up that brandy, there's a good lad. Etta! Where are you? What ails you that you've set out a near-empty bottle on the table? Fetch another, and quickly.'
THE BOY HAD NO HEAD FOR LIQUOR. KENNIT HAD PUT HIM EASILY UNDER THE table, and tending him would occupy the whore. 'Take him to his room,' he told Etta, and watched tolerantly as she pulled him to his feet. He staggered blindly alongside her, groping a hand ahead of him down the passage. Kennit watched them go. Confident that he now had some time to himself, Kennit tucked his crutch firmly under his arm and lurched to his feet. With a ponderously careful tread, he made his way out onto the deck. He was, perhaps, just the slightest bit drunk himself.
It was a fine night still. The stars were distant, a haze of cloud veiling their brilliance. The sea had risen a bit, to run against them, but Vivacia's trim hull cut each wave with rhythmic grace. The wind was steady and stronger than it had been. There was even a faint edge of a whistle in it as it cut past their sails. Kennit cocked his ear to it with a frown, but even as he listened, the sound faded.
Kennit made a slow circuit of the deck. The mate was on the wheel; he acknowledged his captain with a nod, but uttered no word. That was as well.
There would be a man up in the rigging, keeping watch, but he was invisible in the darkness beyond the reach of the ship's muted lanterns. Kennit moved slowly, his tapping crutch a counterpoint to the softness of his step. His ship. The Vivacia was his ship, and he would call her back to life. And when he did, she would know he was her master, and she would be his in a way she had never been Wintrow's. His own liveship, just as he had always deserved. Damn right, he had always deserved his own liveship. Nothing was going to take her from him now. Nothing.
He had come to hate the short ladder that led from the main deck to the elevated foredeck. He managed it now, and not too clumsily, then sat for a moment, catching his breath but pretending simply to study the night. At last he drew his crutch to him, regained his footing and approached the bow rail. He looked over the sea before them. Distant islands were low black hummocks on the horizon. He glanced once at the gray-fleshed figurehead. Then he looked out past her, over the sea.
'Good evening, sweet sea lady,' he greeted her. 'A fine night tonight and a good wind at our backs. What more could we ask?'
He listened to her stillness just as if she had replied. 'Yes. It is good. I'm as relieved as you are to see Wintrow up and about again. He took a good meal, some wine and more brandy. I thought the lad could do with a good sleep to heal him. And, of course, I set Etta to watch over him. It gives us a minute or two to ourselves, my princess. Now. What would please you this evening? I've recalled a lovely old tale from the Southlands. Would you
