by Eric Vall
“Hello, Asher,” a melodious voice said through the darkness of a red-wine hooded cape.
I tried to sit up a little, but the hooded figure pressed the dagger’s point into the skin over my jugular, so I froze.
I darted my eyes around, and from what I could see without moving my head, our little watercraft had run aground somewhere that looked to be a narrow outlet between two high bluffs where the river fed out into the sea. I must have fallen asleep and missed the river juncture, and instead of heading back to Gatetown, we’d somehow found our way to the ocean.
“Who are you, and what do you want?” I asked and clutched a still unconscious Zoie even closer. “You obviously don’t want to kill and rob us because you could have done that already while we slept.”
A chuckle that matched the twinkling of the stars now shining through the deep purple sky flowed out from under the hood. Then the gloved hand that wasn’t holding the blade to my throat reached back and pulled off the cloth obstructing the person’s face.
“You…” I breathed as my jaw dropped open.
“Yes, me,” Shale-Lea, the wife of Bala Ren, said as she shook out her red and gold feathered crest.
The sapphire gem embedded into the head circlet she favored flashed molten in the last rays of sunset, and the phoenix-woman pinned me with emerald eyes sharper than the dagger digging into my neck.
Chapter 17
“You would do well to come with me,” Shale-Lea said as she lowered the dagger.
“Why would I do anything like that?” I asked and remained where I was.
“Because the tide will be coming in shortly, and I’m pretty sure you would rather not be cast out to sea,” she replied in those polished tones that made her sound like she had some sort of upper-crust accent like in high British society or something.
I didn’t really notice it the first time I met her because, to be fair, there was a lot going on that day.
I did remember how beautiful she sounded when she sang during the ceremonial dance, though.
Roofus had woken from under my travel cloak at the sound of that summer sun voice, and he burrowed around like a weird mole until his head popped out of the fabric.
“Skra!” Roofus said as he untangled himself, hopped onto the lip of the boat, and then flew straight into Shale-Lea’s arms as if they were old friends.
“Hello to you, little demon,” Shale-Lea cooed at the gold-seeker and then tutted when she saw his splinted wing. “What kind of trouble have you been getting into, hm?”
“You… know Roofus?” I asked as I watched my sworn enemy’s wife tickle the crow-moth under his beak.
“I raised him as a hatchling from his silk spun cocoon,” Shale-Lea said with a genteel smile on her delicate lips. “I know you are new to the islands, but it is common knowledge my family is known for its animal husbandry.”
“I’ve heard that once or twice,” I murmured as I narrowed my eyes.
Roofus seemed to trust her, and I couldn’t tell if his usual judge of good character was off or not, but so far Shale-Lea seemed harmless, and more importantly, she was alone.
“Come, now,” the gorgeous phoenix-woman said as she stood from her crouch and sheathed the dagger.
“Why, so you can take us to your insane husband? No thanks.” I sat up on my haunches inside the boat and began gathering our things.
“My husband wishes to keep me on a leash, but alas, he cannot. Bala and I might be in close proximity, but I am here on a different matter that I’ve gone to great lengths to conceal.” Her voice was sharp in a way that caught me off guard, and it made me think she really wasn’t out to get us like her husband.
“Well, good luck with all that, but if it’s all the same to you, we’ll make our own way,” I said as I began to rouse Zoie from her deep sleep.
“You don’t trust me,” the bird-woman beauty sighed as she perched Roofus on her shoulder and then fed him some kind of mossy roots she pulled from a crystal vial inside her pocket.
He gobbled it up as if it was cotton candy.
“Not as far as I can throw you,” I answered but then had to soothe Zoie, who opened her glassy eyes in a panic.
“Your wife looks ill, Asher Brightwood,” Shale-Lea said and walked closer so she could look down at us.
“She’ll be okay,” I absently responded as I brushed the hair out of Zoie’s exhausted eyes.
She tried for a moment to focus her confused gaze, but she lost the battle, and her eyelids fell shut again, too tired to stay awake.
I didn’t blame her because her body probably needed to recover from the effects of the ghost king’s enchanted coin.
“It is like she has been cursed thus,” Shale-Lea said as if I hadn’t spoken, and she poked the travel pack with her red-gloved finger as if she knew exactly what was stashed inside. “Yet it is a miracle she lives. How is that, Asher Brightwood?”
I huffed a breath through my nostrils and tried to summon patience I didn’t feel. I couldn’t pin down what the phoenix-woman wanted, and I just wanted to take my wife somewhere she could rest after her ordeal.
So, I ignored Ren’s wife as I put the pack on my back and then stepped over the side of the boat.
“Come on, Zoie,” I said as I lifted her back up into my arms.
She moaned a little and huffed out a labored breath, but she clung weakly to my neck until she passed out again.
“Your wife needs a safe place to recover, Asher,” Shale-Lea said as she blocked my way when I tried to walk past her. “The path back toward Gatetown is far, and you are burdened with precious cargo that could be of interest to any rogues in the night.”
“I’ve got it,” I insisted and tried to move around her so I could follow the river back upstream from where we drifted.
“You are a stubborn one.” The phoenix-woman smirked and skipped back into my way. “Don’t you recognize help when it is being offered to you?”
“Not when I wake up with a blade pressed against my neck, no,” I said and shifted to the side, which she mirrored with another melodious chuckle.
Roofus, the traitor, chortled back in his throat as if he was her personal parrot.
“If you really want to help,” I finally huffed through gritted teeth, “you’ll make sure that feather-brain gets back to Mr. Tovish of the Gate’s Inn. I’m sure you are familiar with it-- it’s the place where your husband tried to kill me. Again.”
“Ah, yes, there have been whispers lately about my husband’s nefarious plots,” she said, but her expression didn’t look particularly bothered.
“This is more than just rich-people gossip, lady,” I scoffed as I marched around her in the direction of the river. “You are his woman. You know what he’s up to.”
I knew Zoie said she believed Shale-Lea was unhappy in her marriage to Ren, but since he was trying to outright kill me, and the bird-woman was currently still his wife, I couldn’t be too careful.
“I do not,” Shale-Lea said as she shook her head. “Well, I am finding out.”
“Oh?” I snorted. “The wife of a duelist is supposed to be compelled to serve him, right?”
“He…” the woman faltered before she cleared her throat. “He doesn’t tell me things. He just tells me to run the estate. It seems as though he doesn’t want me involved in his… pursuits, so--”
“So, you are trying to figure out what he’s up to?” I raised an eyebrow.
“My sources are sound, and I know he means to kill the Asher Lord,” she said as she raised her voice so it would carry over the sound of the ocean waves.
I stopped and turned around to face her.
I was about to say something biting about how if she was just here to play games with me then she could fuck off back to her bastard of a husband, but before I could, Zoie coughed and shivered violently in my arms.
“Zoie?” I asked as I lowered her to the sandy ground. Her skin felt warm to the touch even though she was still damp like I was, and there was a chill bree
ze in the air.
Suddenly, Shale-Lea was there kneeling down beside us in a wisp of cedar perfume, and she pulled off one of her scarlet gloves so she could rest her pale hand against Zoie’s burning forehead.
“I don’t understand, the curse was lifted,” I muttered as the familiar ringing panic twisted inside my gut like a writhing snake.
“She is over-exhausted and has been in these wet clothes for far too long,” Shale-Lea said and pulled out another vial from her red cape. This one was filled with a lilac-colored liquid and had a dropper on the top. “It’s not unusual for a sickness to set in when her vigors are already so taxed.”
“What are you doing?” I asked as the crimson-haired phoenix moved the loaded dropper toward Zoie’s lips.
“This will help fight her fever,” she said and continued with the liquid, but I snatched her wrist and halted her.
“Why should I trust you?” I asked with a glare. “What do you even want?”
Suddenly, Shale-Lea’s demeanor changed, and her wrist went limp in my grasp. Then her emerald green eyes lost some of their lustrous brightness as she looked off into the distance.
“Wanting,” she said in a solemn voice. “That is the true curse, isn’t it?”
She seemed a little broken just then, as if her proud and graceful exterior cracked just a bit and allowed me to see a diminished and gentle creature underneath. This brief peek under her noble mask threw me for a loop, and I was derailed from my aggression toward her.
“Why are you here?” I asked her in a low voice.
As if realizing where she was, Shale-Lea shook herself out of whatever haunting thoughts consumed her and met my concerned gaze.
“I am here because I think you are the one who might help me,” the beautiful phoenix-woman answered, and her verdant eyes filled with tears that dropped down her face like crystals on a chandelier.
I frowned and then released her wrist.
“I’m pretty sure your husband and I are going to duel,” I said.
“Yes,” she whispered as she glanced downward.
“He might kill me,” I said.
“He might,” she agreed.
“I might kill him,” I said.
“You might,” she agreed.
“How would you feel about that?” I asked.
“Feel about you killing him?” she whispered as she met my eyes. “I am but a woman. I am property of an Asher. I’m not allowed feelings.”
“If I killed him, you would be mine,” I said.
“Yes, I would.” Her eyes burned into mine like the hot part of a Bunsen burner.
“But you aren’t allowed to have any feelings about that?” I finally asked.
“If that came to pass, I would have many feelings,” she whispered. “Perhaps I could share them with you at that point.”
“I understand,” I said as I looked back down at Zoie’s flushed cheeks and dewy brow. “Help her if you can.”
Shale-Lea smiled and wiped the tears out of her eyes. She then took the glass dropper and administered a single bead of light purple liquid between Zoie’s red lips.
“Your wife should be mostly recovered by tomorrow,” Shale-Lea said as she returned the vial to her pocket. “She needs to rest, as you can clearly see. Will you trust me further, Asher, when I say my intentions are to lead you and the Lady Zoie to a safe place for the night? Let us keep my husband out of the discussion. This is between the two of us, and I want to help you.”
“And your intentions after that?” I asked, even though I was mostly convinced she was being honest. But still, she was married to the guy gunning for me and the king of the island, so I had to at least ask. “No offense, but you have the most to gain by betraying us to Ren the second I let you take us somewhere.”
“The only other intention I have is to talk with you, Asher,” she said and put her gloves back on. She then rose elegantly to her feet and walked a few paces before she stopped and addressed me over her shoulder. “Then, after that, you might come to understand.”
Without anything further, she lifted her red hood and started walking back in the direction of the towering bluffs.
I sighed and looked down at Zoie. The spots of scarlet on her cheeks were fading somewhat, and her brow no longer had that pained wrinkle in the middle. She looked peaceful, and I breathed a sigh of relief that at least I could rule out Shale-Lea plotting to poison us.
“Please wake up soon,” I whispered into her velvet ear before I chastely kissed her lips. Then I got to my feet with her cradled up in my arms once more.
“Alex,” she sighed in her dreams, and I steeled my resolve even though I still mistrusted the phoenix-woman. Despite my wariness, Zoie was the top priority, and it was clear she was at her limit.
“Kaw!” Roofus cawed at me from where Shale-Lea had stopped to wait with patient grace.
The gold-seeker moth seemed to have no doubts about her, and a universal constant I’d always counted on was the instinct of animals.
For a while, old Leary kept an old basset hound around for company that mostly lounged around and stunk up the back with his smelly farts. But the one time we almost got robbed, the loyal hound went from dead to sixty and tore after the fucker before he even had a chance to pull his gun.
Therefore, if Roofus trusted Shale-Lea, then that had to be a good sign.
Yeah.
I still frowned when I considered I was just trying to rationalize my anxiety away at the thought of this all being an elaborate trap.
“Are you and the Lady Zoie well?” the phoenix-woman asked and broke me out of my uneasy thoughts.
“Where are you taking us?” I shot back instead, and I watched her from the corner of my eye as we walked side-by-side.
Shale-Lea inhaled as she cast her gemstone eyes down to the ground, and I felt a small pang of regret for how harsh my tone was. I really had no choice but to trust her, and if she really was honest about trying to help me, then she was the one who actually had the most to lose if she was caught.
“I have my own sailing vessel waiting in a cove on the other side of this bluff,” she said and raised her gaze to the inky sky as night started to blanket the land.
“Your husband lets you have your own sailboat?” I asked.
“My husband’s approval is not needed if he has no knowledge of how I manage our funds,” she said with a regal smirk, and she raised her chin in pride.
“Does he suspect you’re here at all?” I raised an eyebrow. “Does he know you are following him?”
Shale-Lea glanced sideways at me like a sly fox with a secret, and I couldn’t help but admire her long eyelashes and those pale-pink lips as they curled up into a wicked grin.
“My husband does not,” she said and reached up toward her shoulder so she could stroke Roo’s fuzzy head.
I huffed, and we were both content to make the rest of the trek to the cove in companionable silence.
When I rounded the craggy walls of the bluff, I blinked in surprise at the sleek sailing vessel anchored in the narrow cove. It looked mostly like a medieval merchant ship with two sails for added speed, but there were two “castle” like structures on either end that were clearly fighting platforms, so that meant this ship was also built to defend itself.
“You have a beautiful vessel,” I said as we got closer.
“Thank you,” Shale-Lea replied as she dipped her head like a true Lady, and the sapphire on her forehead glinted in the starlight. “The Soaring Light is my pride and joy. She is the fastest vessel gold can buy on Nata.”
I smiled a bit and admired the ship as we got closer. I’d always wanted to learn how to sail, and this craft was really a work of art with all of its highly polished cherry wood finish and its crimson and gold sails.
“Lady off the port-side!” someone called out, and I halted in my steps and looked around.
“Relax,” the phoenix-woman said as she lowered her hood and waved up at someone on deck about fifteen feet above us. “The c
rew of this ship answer to me and me alone. They will not betray your presence.”
A man who had the features of a bird of prey similar to a black falcon lowered himself on a manual lift that was on a basic pulley and rope system. When he was close enough to the ground, he jumped off, splashed through the knee-high water, and ran for Shale-Lea.
“Sister!” the man said with a large grin on his face, and he gathered her up into a fierce hug and spun her around off her feet.
“Back from business so soon, Brother?” Shale-Lea giggled as the falcon-man set her back on the ground.
“A little bumblebird told me you were here conducting some illicit business of your own,” he said as he turned his sharp gold-green eyes on me, and then he smirked as he scanned me from head to toe. “Friends of yours, Sis?”
“Yes,” she said and then beckoned me and Zoie closer. “Will you operate the lift for us? I’m afraid our guests are in dire need of rest, and the Lady is ill.”
“I will make sure to relay to the crew that every comfort should be afforded to our esteemed guests,” Shale-Lea’s brother said as he bowed his dark feathered head.
I nodded and then followed the bird siblings into the water so I could step up onto the wooden plank. When all of us were on the lift, the falcon-man started to pull us up to the deck of the ship.
“Make way!” the man said and jumped over the side so he could help his sister clear the tall ledge, and then he approached me and offered his arms. “Here, let me take her so you may climb aboard.”
“Uhhh…” I looked down at Zoie. There was no way I could keep hold of her and climb onto the deck at the same time, so I had to let this stranger help.
“I understand what I ask of you is not an easy task.” He grinned at me in a way that seemed as if he was familiar with me. “But I am a man of honor, and I hope you might trust me when I say we are friends.”
Something about the way he said that niggled at the back of my mind, but before I could grasp it, the thought slipped through my muddled brain. Whatever the case, I was already in with this crowd, and there wasn’t really the option to turn back, so I handed over Zoie and then climbed over the barrier as quickly as possible.
