Sea Witch and the Magician

by Savage, Vivienne

  The food didn’t disappoint, and while eating, Joren didn’t question her incessantly. She passed on the wine but accepted seconds on the fish.

  “I wonder if it’s an islander thing.”

  She paused with a forkful of fish held halfway to her mouth. “Pardon?”

  “The wine. I have a friend, she didn’t care much for it either.” His expression fell.

  “She is an islander?”

  “Yes. Coral Shell is her name. At least, that’s what we’d come to call her.” He glanced over. “Perhaps you know her. She’s mute.”

  “I have no friends among the islanders.” She set aside her silverware and wiped her mouth. “Thank you for the meal, but I should return to the water.”

  “You’ve had no rest.”

  “You assume I need it.”

  “You won’t tell me anything about yourself, but even a witch must require rest. I assure you, no one will be staring if you choose to take a stateroom.”

  “A room?”

  “What? Did you think I’d make you sleep on the deck?”

  She hadn’t assumed anything but receiving a cabin of her own never crossed her mind. For a moment, she considered turning it down. If it weren’t for her promise to help the fleet, she could have been to Ridaeron by now. Traveling at their slow pace meant an extended journey, and she was tiring.

  “Thank you,” she conceded. “A bed will be most welcome.”

  “Good. I’ll show you to one now if you’re ready.”

  After what had been an enjoyable break, the returning pain seemed more excruciating than ever. Her step faltered, and she drew a hissed breath between her teeth. Joren was at her side in an instant.

  “You are hurting,” he said, voice accusatory.

  “I’m not—” Before the rest of Caecilia’s lie left her tongue, Joren swept her off her feet, quite literally, and into his arms. “This isn’t necessary.”

  “The hell it isn’t. We have a physician aboard the ship who can help you.”

  “Nothing can help me.”

  “You won’t know until we try.”

  “Trust me. I do know. It isn’t an ordinary pain that ails me, Joren. It’s a curse, and no one save King Triton or another god can remove it. Unless you have a divine being serving on this vessel, there’s nothing you can do to alleviate my pain.”

  “Oh.” He didn’t set her down, still cradling her in his arms as if she were a child. Or a bride. The latter thought flustered her and sent heat across her face again. “My apologies, Caecilia. Are you always in pain?”

  “Only when I wear legs.”

  His expression melted from concern to horror. “And I forced you to leave behind the comfort of the ocean to join me. Gods, I’m sorry. If I’d realized, I would have let you be.”

  And she would have missed out on one hell of a delicious meal. Staying in Eisland under the guise of Coral Shell had accustomed her to their exquisite cuisine, and she didn’t look forward to returning to the water and swimming alongside them to dine on raw fish and kelp. Likewise, drowsiness settled over her mind, and lying against his chest felt so nice. Joren’s warmth radiated through his shirt and waistcoat. She yawned.

  “If I understand correctly, there’s no pain as long as you’re not on your feet?”

  “Right.”

  “And you don’t require constant contact with the water?”

  “No.”

  “Then rest overnight in my quarters. There’s a cot in the day cabin that will suit me just fine.”

  “That isn’t necessary.”

  “We have three days of sailing ahead of us, and it behooves the entire fleet if you’re rested prior to reaching Ridaeron’s shores.”

  Chapter 22

  With a perilous sea battle looming before him, Joren paced the day cabin’s office and tried to drink away his nervous jitters, walking a precarious balance of sipping enough to calm down and have a good night’s rest, but not so much he impaired his decision-making skills.

  As Caecilia was in his bed, he sprawled across the cot aft of his desk. A solid hour passed of staring at the compartment overhead before he finally resorted to a trick that had always worked when he and Rapunzel were children.

  He uncovered the floor-length magical mirror on the wall and traced the runes on the wooden frame, activating his half of the enchantment. “Mirror, mirror, on the wall, is my sister awake at all?” he called through the shimmering pane, half in sing-song.

  “She does stir at this hour,” Rapunzel’s voice echoed from the mirror pane. “Freshly awakened from a shower.” She sounded too cheerful for a woman who should have been asleep. It was past midnight, the black sky speckled with stars.

  His sister whisked the sheet away from her duplicate and stood on her side in her night-rail and an open robe, waist-length silver hair damp and gathered over one shoulder. It trailed down to her rounded belly and—

  Joren paused. “What in the name of Eisen is going on with your stomach?”

  Rapunzel blinked down. “Um.”

  “Gods. Don’t tell me he’s got you up the duff again? Already?” That explained her sudden foray into big and fluffy dresses.

  “Already? It’s been more than two years since the twins were born!”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he shouted, a little louder than intended. “I’m your bloody brother for Siel’s sake. I’d have liked to know I have another little niece or nephew—could it be twins again?—to spoil rotten. Now I’m even angrier that my gift to you sank in the Viridian.” He sighed. He’d brought her back a fruit-bearing sapling from Samahara, charmed and enchanted to produce the sweetest pears, apples, peaches, and figs across the desert, and in large quantities. All from the same tree. It had been a marvel of magic and botanical science. He’d have to visit soon to fetch her another. He’d teased her for months about the way she ate her way through the castle’s fruit stores during her first pregnancy.

  “Three reasons. First, I didn’t want the news to overshadow everything else that’s happened or your imminent proposal to Coral. Second, there’s a war on the horizon, and the attention shouldn’t be on me. Third, I don’t need gifts from you to know you love me. It’s fine. Come home to me safely. That’s all the gift I need.”

  “It’s good news, Rapunzel. We’re all in need of good news. Answer my blasted question.”

  “We don’t know yet if it’s twins again. Muir suspects. He’s positive my belly kicked him from two different positions tonight. Whoever is in here,” she said, cradling her stomach with one hand, “they’re active, and seem comforted by lengthy showers and lavender steam. But this isn’t why you contacted me at midnight.”

  Joren grunted. “You don’t know that.”

  “You would have had to know I was expecting to call me to discuss it, Joren.”

  He chuckled. “Point.”

  She tilted her head, studying him. He wondered what she saw besides bedhead and dark circles under his tired eyes. “Are you nervous?”

  “Incredibly.”

  “It’s all right to be nervous. If experience is the mother of wisdom, then anxiety is the father of caution. Listen to your instincts.”

  “I plan to. I ignored them when the Green Giant came for us. I won’t let that happen again.”

  “I imagine you’ll reach their shores by tomorrow night. Is the plan unchanged?”

  “We’re set to attack exactly as planned. Ilithyia and Joaidane will strike Vatnslind on their northern coastline while the rest of us split our forces between their slave island and the southern port. If anything, it’s more important than ever that we tear that stronghold down. That’s where they’ll be keeping the islanders.”

  His sister dipped her head. “I feel awful that they’ve been dragged into our feud.”

  “It would have happened eventually. Ridaeron has taken from everyone they could reach. When they went unchallenged by the Sea Witch, they took advantage. It had nothing to do with us.”

  “Speaking of th
e Sea Witch…how is that alliance going?”

  “Well enough, I suppose. She’s been on board the past few nights, saving her strength for the battle to come.”

  “That must have the crew on edge. I hear she’s rather frightening.”

  Though there was no malice in his sister’s voice, he bristled all the same. “Looks aren’t everything, as you well know. Our…the woman who raised us was the most beautiful woman in all of Eisland. And she also had the ugliest soul in all the seven seas. So you’ll forgive me if looks are no longer factored into the equation of determining a person’s value.”

  Rapunzel’s eyes widened. “I never said they were. Honestly, Joren, you know me better than that.”

  His shoulders slumped, and he dropped his face into his hands, groaning. “I know, I know. I’m sorry. Others don’t see past her haggard appearance and there have been mutterings amongst some of the crew about her being a bad omen. That it’s bad luck having her aboard.”

  Bless his sister’s kind soul for frowning when she heard that. “I trust you’ve nipped that in the bud.”

  “Naturally. I said any man bearing issue against having Caecilia aboard can swim home.”

  He realized his mistake before her brows shot upward. “You are now on a first name basis with her?”

  “What else am I to call her? Witch? Crone?”

  “I suppose that makes sense.” She sighed and ran a hand over her gravid belly. “Well, my faith is with you, Joren. Whatever tomorrow brings, I know you’ll do what’s best for our kingdom and our allies. Ridaeron can no longer be allowed to rule the Viridian.”

  “Thanks, Rapunzel. Coming from you, that means everything to me.”

  “And don’t worry about Coral,” she said quickly. “I’m certain she’ll be waiting for you when you return to Neverland. She cares for you, I know it.”

  The final vestiges of worry eased from his heart. As always, his sister knew exactly the right thing to say.

  “I hope you’re right. Anyway, get some sleep and take care of those babies. I expect details upon my return.”

  He deactivated the enchantment and covered the mirror, feeling more confident about what the next day would bring. Then he’d worry about his future with his missing Coral Shell.

  Fate wouldn’t be so cruel as to gift him his soul mate then steal her away again.

  * * *

  The riders had been on horseback since nightfall, hooves tearing up soil still damp from an afternoon rain. Cara couldn’t deny that the Ridaeron Dynasty’s green pastures and countryside were things of beauty, but their desperate race across the rolling meadows afforded her no opportunity to stop and admire them.

  Of the ten mounts they’d taken for their group of eleven mages, only seven remained. She’d always mourn the gentle giants that had sacrificed their lives to save her friends and bear them away to safety. Their hearts had given out, bodies pushed beyond their limits.

  Aurora had wept. The child loved horses, and gods, if it wasn’t a decision between their lives and the creatures’ well-being, Cara would never forgive herself. It will be worth it, she thought. Their sacrifices can’t be in vain now. We must escape.

  Though she didn’t know the other mages beyond their imprisonment together, she considered them more than mere acquaintances. They’d passed through hell together and would soon come out on the other side. At least, she hoped so.

  She thought of Biram, an older and quiet Samaharan man who spoke very little but could always be counted on to play a game of chess. He’d been the first she encountered with her key, and also the one to voluntarily stay behind and guarantee their escape.

  From what she’d learned of the eleven mages, they were the mightiest of the kingdom’s recent acquisitions, and also the most unpredictable; spellcasters with nothing to lose and also feared most by their captors. With the exception of Cara and Aurora, they had no lovers, spouses, or relatives to threaten with harm.

  Hoofbeats thundered behind them in the distance, loud and pounding to her ears despite their pursuers lagging so far behind. Less than five minutes prior, some Ridaeron in a watch tower had spied them coming down the hills, and now they were in for the race of their lives.

  But their mounts were slowing, mouths foaming around their harsh metal bits and coats glistening with sweat. What remained of the enchantment would soon fade, barely more than a golden gleam around their enormous hooves.

  Their hunters, on fresh and unexhausted horses, would soon close the distance and reach them.

  “Cara, I’m scared!” Aurora cried. Cara both loathed and appreciated learning enough Ridaeron over the past weeks to understand her.

  Cara tightened her arm around the child’s waist, keeping her in the saddle. “Don’t be scared, angel. We’ll be there soon.”

  It was a dirty lie. None of them knew where there would be, or what they would do upon reaching there. In hindsight, the spur of the moment plan had to be one of the foolhardiest decisions she’d ever made.

  “We can’t push them any harder, Cara!” Amun cried. He rounded out their group as the youngest of the male sorcerers, only twenty-one years old, she’d learned. “They’ll die, and then we will be walking through this terrain, exposed. We must slow down.”

  “If we slow down, they’ll catch up to us,” Sarah disagreed, the Mordenian enchantress made of sterner stuff than Cara, as she’d cast the most recent round of haste spells without sympathy for the creatures. She glanced over one shoulder and extended her hand, conjuring a fireball that scorched a mile-long path through the green plains toward their pursuers.

  The flaming sphere gained speed and traction, a flash of power and heat igniting the grass in a white-hot streak. Upon reaching its destination, one of the giant guards smacked it with his shield. It fizzled into a cloud of embers.

  Sarah swore. “We have no choice but to renew the haste spell.”

  “What good is freedom if we make monsters of ourselves? Enough have died. I won’t whip these animals any more than we already have,” Amun snarled.

  “Nor will I!” cried their wood elven companion. Eianara had been the voice of reason since their escape. “But we can’t afford to be divided.”

  “We can’t,” Amun agreed, slowing down until he fell behind them. “Carry on and be strong, my friends! I will hold them back for as long as I can.”

  “Amun!” Aurora sobbed, twisting to look at him from under Cara’s arm with one pale white hand outstretched.

  But it was too late. The Samaharan mage’s horse stood on trembling legs, mighty chest heaving as it staggered to the side. He slid from the saddle onto his feet and raised both arms toward the sky, whipping up the wind and darkening the heavens.

  That was the last Cara saw of him before their horses carried them beyond sight, making Amun the second of their small company to sacrifice himself so that they may live in freedom.

  Chapter 23

  The thick fog rolling across the Viridian rose higher than the Cannon’s top mast. Joren stood on the quarterdeck and listened to the water lapping against the sides of the ship, the only sound beyond the wind guiding them to their target.

  Miles away in the distance, a single lighthouse blazed on a hilltop.

  “Any moment now,” Joren muttered, watching the steady movement of the revolving lens.

  They’d sent a small team of their three stealthiest men ahead, one a sorcerer from Samahara, the other two Ridaeron natives from aboard the Jolly Roger with familiarity of the land. Osrim had said there’d be two slaves at the top of the lighthouse at all times, in addition to a keeper tasked with monitoring them.

  “Do you think they were discovered?” Faolan asked.

  “I hope not,” Joren murmured, counting on the trio to extinguish the light and grant them the element of surprise. “We—” The tower went dark, pitching the shoreline and much of the coastal village into shadow.

  “What do you see?” Joren asked Faolan, as the griffins and most of the other shifters had s
pectacular night time vision.

  “I see movement toward the tower to investigate. No one appears to be alarmed yet.”

  “Then we advance before they have a reason to suspect something is amiss.”

  Between Caecilia and Baptiste, with Joren’s minor assistance, they’d shrouded the entire attacking fleet. After vowing to disable any potential dangers on the water, the witch had returned to the water and sunk under the surface.

  “Are the Marines prepared to deploy?” he asked the fresh-faced naval captain who had transferred to the Cannon. Pierre’s wiry frame looked as if a stiff wind would blow him overboard, but he was deadly with a pistol and even sharper wielding a blade.

  “Aye, Admiral, preparations are complete.”

  “Good. Alert the men below to be ready to fire on the signal. We’re almost in position. I’ll be joining the shore team shortly.”

  “That wasn’t the plan,” Faolan cut in, shooting him an inquisitive look. He turned to face Joren and crossed both brawny arms across his chest. Like the rest of the fighters participating in the invasion, he wore leather armor under his blue and silver coat, the jacket at odds with his clan tartan. Every Oclander had resisted the white trousers of the Eisland Navy’s official uniform, demanding to keep their tartans instead. Muir had ruled in their favor, stipulating that none of them would be fighting in human form long enough for it to matter.

  Gods bless him, Muir had a point. Respecting their preference for fighting in their beastly forms, almost all of the griffins had been outfitted months ago in barding tailored to their unique shapes, protecting them whether they fought on two legs or four.

  “I know, but I’ll be more useful on the ground. Besides, I won’t have anyone else do what I won’t myself.”

  “As you say, but your sister will have my hide if you come back in anything less than one piece.” He paused and scratched his chin. “Unless that witch beats her to it.”