The Wrack

by John Bierce

  She found teak a hassle and a half to work with, but the board had turned out decently. Despite lacking metal tools, the Nemennemak boards had been considerably more elegant. She wasn’t sure how they pulled that one off.

  Ann handed Eissa her waterproof canvas satchel first, which Eissa slung over her back. It contained dry clothes, her canteen, rope, and iron pitons to anchor the rope from the top when she got there. Next Ann handed over her double ended paddle, the blades set at right angles to one another. The Nemennemak only used single ended paddles, but they were going for maneuverability and compactness, not speed.

  Eissa untied the rope from the little hole she’d carved in the back of the wave rider, then turned towards the front and kneeled.

  “Good luck,” Ann called.

  Eissa took a deep breath and started paddling away from Ann and the dinghy.

  They’d rowed the dinghy into the lee of a rock spire jutting from the sea. Before Eissa paddled the wave-rider out of that same lee, she gently patted her arm pouch to check that her eyes were still there. Of her nearly two dozen eyes, she’d only brought three, plus the nephrite in her socket— her little arm pouch couldn’t hold any more.

  She didn’t bother to swim her mind into the aether currents, because she’d never left them. Other seers only dove down into their unreal depths when they needed to look into things, but Eissa stayed in them even when sleeping.

  From her living left eye, Eissa saw the crashing spray, rocks jutting from the sea, and off in the distance, the imposing seacliff that was her target.

  From her right eye, Eissa saw so much more.

  Nephrite was by far her favorite eye. In its domain, it gave clarity unmatched by any other gem in their own domains, save perhaps emerald, and nephrite’s domain was the sea. Once she’d learned to interpret the ripples and waves in the aetheric currents, the sea became her domain as well. She could see every current, every undertow, every wash. She could see fish swimming about below, and rock spines lurking so close beneath the surface they would gut even a dinghy.

  And from both eyes, she saw the massive waves rolling in a steady, relentless line, crashing a solid dozen feet up against the cliff.

  For whatever strange reason, during this world’s creation, the shale hadn’t been made to rise as far here as over the rocky beach on the other side of the island. Over there, the sandstone was a good eighty feet in the air. The sandstone cap of the island sat at an odd angle atop the shale, though, and on this side, the sandstone was far lower.

  Just about a foot or two above where the waves crested against the cliff, in fact.

  If she’d been trying to climb anyhow, the shale was still too crumbly and awful to ascend. And the sandstone leaned far over it, creating a lip as wide as fifteen feet in places. In one spot, though— one narrow spot— a great chunk of the sandstone had crumbled, leaving a narrow chimney leading upwards.

  Climbing the shale wouldn’t work, but riding a wave over it straight to the sandstone chimney?

  Probably still wouldn’t work, but it wasn’t impossible. Though, in fairness, any reasonable person— and most madmen— would call it an insane death-trap.

  Eissa laughed, and paddled straight into it.

  Eissa’s back muscles were already straining a little by the time she approached the cliff. She could swim all day or row a dinghy without getting tired, but paddling her wave rider was quite different than either.

  For most of the approach, she’d been just building up speed, dodging rock spires, and trying not to capsize on the huge swells.

  Then she finally caught a wave of the right size, and it had just been a mad sprint to stay on the wave and stay positioned just right.

  The spray kept splashing her live eye, and rather than blink it clear, she had shut it entirely, depending solely on the milky green aetheric currents to guide her.

  It was strange, paddling madly atop the wave and hearing crashing foam around her, while merely seeing the peaceful green currents dancing around. She could interpret them well enough to know what was around her, but it looked absolutely nothing like the physical waves and rocks.

  Rapidly growing closer to her was a field of aether where the ripples water cast in the currents simply stopped, and were replaced with the incredibly faint ripples that were all nephrite could see of what rocks cast into the aether.

  Eissa took a deep breath, threw aside her paddle, and stood up on the wave rider.

  Then, as the wave drew towards the cliff, she leapt.

  For a moment Eissa felt like she was flying, and then she threw her arms out to either side of her as she slammed into the cliff and was drenched in the spray. She felt shale crumbling at her feet and thought she’d failed for a moment, and then she realized that her arms were wedged into the sides of the sandstone chimney.

  The first few moments were the hardest. The chimney was widest at the bottom, and her weight was resting on her arms and shoulders. She thankfully hadn’t misjudged the width of the chimney, so her arms weren’t at full extension. If they had been, she wasn’t sure she would have been able to pull herself up.

  She ached from paddling and from slamming against the stone, but she couldn’t take time to rest, lest her arms give out.

  She carefully, slowly, swung her left foot up, she and managed to get that foot wedged into the sandstone chimney.

  By this time, she’d blinked her living eye free of the saltwater and could look around her.

  Above her and to her right was a little outcropping of sandstone. If she grabbed it, she could pull herself up a little and get her right leg into the rock chimney. She’d have most of her weight on the right side of the chimney then, and if the little outcrop broke, she’d fall to the waves below, and she wasn’t sure if even a swimmer as strong as her could survive in that.

  Another wave crashed below her, splashing her with droplets of saltwater. She took another deep breath and pushed with her left leg while shooting her right upwards. Her fingers barely— oh so barely— wrapped around the outcrop.

  And it held.

  Eissa breathed out a sigh of relief, and pulled her right leg up, bracing it against the chimney.

  She still didn’t rest yet, instead pulling herself a few more steps and handholds up the chimney. It wasn’t as bad as she’d feared— the rockfall was still recent, so the waves hadn’t had time to smooth the base of the chimney out too much. And this sandstone was fairly durable compared to a lot of sandstones she’d encountered— and just as easy to climb.

  The chimney constricted a bit, until Eissa could comfortably rest her weight on her legs and give her arms a little break. She sighed in relief, then opened one of the eye pockets on her arm pouch. She then reached up and carefully popped out her nephrite eye. She felt her shoulders tense automatically as half her world went dark. Careful not to drop it in the brutal surf below, she slid it into the open slot, and buttoned it closed again. She then popped open the next pouch, and pulled out her garnet eye, slotting it into her empty socket.

  She felt a sting of salt water in her socket that had gotten on the garnet, but within two blinks, her mind was swimming the aetheric currents again, the stinging inhibiting it not at all, and her shoulders relaxed again.

  Garnet was especially unusual among gemstones— it was attuned to stone, but perhaps too attuned. The ripples and waves in the aetheric currents were so thick as to be almost opaque. Though that made the currents far more visible than those of other gems, almost becoming a detriment, they came so thick and close together.

  When you first looked at stone through a garnet seer’s eye, it looked almost black. Save, curiously, for garnet, spinel, and a few other uncommon minerals— those didn’t show up at all in the garnet currents. Spinel was the only one of those used often other than garnet, and its uses were very different. Curiously, garnet and other spinels didn’t show up to spinel eyes either.

  A mystery indeed, and one she intended to solve someday, but not one Eissa had time for at the
moment. She rested weight on her arms again and began clambering upwards.

  It took some training before you could learn to see between the thick garnet ripples, but once you could, it let you see the innards of the stones themselves. It might seem frivolous to those who didn’t know better, for stone was just an undifferentiated mass to the ignorant, but stone had a grain, like wood, and it had flaws and cracks that any mason, architect, or sculptor must know.

  Or, in this case, a madwoman climbing a cliff.

  Garnet guided Eissa’s hands and feet to secure cracks and strong outcroppings, warning her when a seemingly innocuous patch of sandstone was unstable and at risk of breaking.

  She could have levered her back against one wall of the chimney and shimmied up it, but that would be a disadvantageous position when she reached the top, and one that— somewhat illogically, she knew— felt like it gave her less control, even if it was easier on her muscles.

  As she approached the roof of the chimney, where the top of the tall, narrow wedge of rock had fallen out, she edged farther and farther back, until her hands and feet almost touched the edges of the chimney. Then she took a moment to peer upwards through the rock above her head for handholds. Locating a likely one, she reached up and back with her left hand and inserted her hand into the crack. She did the same with the right hand, grabbing onto a small but stable nub of rock.

  Then, slowly and cautiously, her back muscles straining, she leaned back until her head and torso were coming out from under the chimney’s roof, and began slowly edging her feet farther up the sides of the chimney. She eyed the structure of the rock above her, then lifted her right hand up, leaving most of her weight on her left hand at this angle. She crossed her right hand over her left, then grabbed onto another crack.

  Her shoulders groaned and complained of the awkward angle, but she edged her feet higher. Her butt was jutting out now, and even less weight rested on her feet.

  As much as this position hurt, Eissa took her time planning out her next move. She took a series of deep, fast breaths, then let go with her left hand and leapt upwards.

  For a moment that felt like an eternity, Eissa’s right hand was the only part of her touching the cliff. She felt as though her heart was going to explode out of her chest and her stomach fall out of her mouth.

  And then her left hand sunk into the particularly deep crack she’d been aiming for, and her left foot landed on a nub of sandstone, and she was kissing the cliff face, her heart pounding.

  Afterward, Eissa could never have told how long she spent clambering up the cliff. It felt like an eternity, and when she reached the top, she collapsed onto the ground, panting.

  She was covered in scrapes, bruises, and cuts, like she always was after a climb. She had a truly massive bruise on one leg that she somehow hadn’t noticed until she reached the top— if she had to guess, her wave-rider had slammed into her thigh as she leapt to the chimney. Her muscles all burned and ached, and she doubted she’d be able to move much at all the next day.

  And yet…

  Her mind rested quiet, without the constant churn of ideas and impulses that often kept her awake far into the night and kept her from holding still during the day. She treasured moments like this, when she wore herself out from physical exertion, mental exertion, or a bout of lovemaking. Moments when she could just rest at peace for a moment, and forget about the expectations of her fathers and her people. Forget about her constant hunger for new experiences and new ideas. Forget her frustration and disappointment at how slow and dull most people were, and forget about plagues and idiot empires following the idiot commands of idiot leaders.

  She just stared at the blustery sky that couldn’t decide whether it wanted clouds or sun and felt at peace.

  Until, of course, a perplexed gull pecked her in the forehead.

  “I’m going to enjoy eating you,” Eissa muttered.

  The bird cocked its head at her and squawked.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Defeat Without Ever Fighting A Battle

  In some lives the regrets pile up young.

  Opportunities not taken. Dances not danced. Words said in haste and anger.

  In other lives they stretch out.

  Apologies never made. Ambitions unrealized. Years wasted in stubbornness.

  For a precious few lives, those lives most interesting to the poets whose hearts love the tragic, the regrets pile up right at the end.

  Knight-Marshall Ulric of Westfen, commander of the Royal Army of Geredain, cousin of His Majesty King Albrecht the Resolute, ninth of that name and title, rightful ruler of Geredain and the rebel territory of Lothain, was one of those people.

  Honestly, his cousin, Albrecht, really should have been one of those lives as well, but Ulric had not once in his life ever seen Albrecht regret anything. He’d seen Albrecht blame others for failures, but to regret failures would be to admit that Albrecht was anything less than perfect, and so far as Albrecht was concerned, that was the next best thing to treason.

  Though, Ulric contemplated, as he was led up to the gallows behind his cousin, there were surely poets who would write about Albrecht anyway. Perhaps give him a stirring gallows speech, instead of spitting, cursing, and demanding to be set free.

  And crying. Can’t forget the crying.

  Ulric’s title of Knight-Marshall was, to say the least, bunk. Nonsense. Pointless. A complete farce.

  It wasn’t that he was a bad knight or soldier, by any means. He was up training at dawn every day, with sword and lance and bow. There were few more accomplished riders in all of Geredain. He should know, he had a permanent offer of a purse of silver for anyone who could beat him in a horse race. He’d paid it out seven times, but compared to the number of contests he’d had?

  Well, Ulric felt he deserved a little bragging.

  His accomplishments didn’t just lie in the realm of the physical, either. Ulric spoke five languages, could recite over a hundred poems by heart, and had a singing voice that, while hardly the most beautiful, was perfectly suited to any song of the sort that people would laugh at and clap along to. He’d read more books than any other knight in Geredain— and most of the nobles. He’d memorized every map of Teringia— and quite a few of northern Oyansur. He’d studied the memoirs of all the great generals, spending hours interviewing every single officer who’d commanded a battle or skirmish for Geredain.

  Ulric was quite aware of how many men held military posts merely for their blood, and he was determined to prove his worth by deed as well. Not that he’d say that out loud— he didn’t want to offend his ancestors. Still, he’d always wanted to be counted as among the worthiest of his family’s dead someday.

  That last would be unlikely to happen now.

  The reason his post as commander of the armies of Geredain was meaningless was, of course, Albrecht. His cousin, as sure as he ever was of his own brilliance and valor, personally took over the command of every last ancestor-forsworn skirmish he could, and he demanded Ulric’s presence at his side at all times in battle.

  Ulric had never decided whether that made him a glorified attendant, a trained speaking crow, or just a theater prop.

  He rather liked crows, and the thought of relieving himself on his cousin like a poorly trained bird had, shamefully enough, crossed his mind on one or two occasions over the years.

  Well, rather more occasions than that.

  Ulric had never written poetry, but he’d tried to live his life so the poets might write about him. He’d prepared himself so that when the day the Usurper in Lothain showed weakness, when it was time for the royal line of the Resolute to retake their long-stolen throne, he would be there as the tip of Geredain’s spear. No poet would need struggle to fit him into their epic retellings of Geredain’s battles.

  No poet would likely even try to fit him into one of their works, now, for Geredain had fought no epic battles here.

  Geredain had the greatest population of Moonsworn on Teringia. You’d hav
e to go south past Galicanta to the Sunsworn Empire on Oyansur to rival it. Some of the most brilliant minds of all Iopis came to dwell in Geredain, in great part thanks to the Geredain’s Eye of the King— one of the few emerald eyes that had ever been made, and one of only three on Teringia. And, rarer yet, the Geredain kings were among the few who would lend its use to scholars from other nations— save, of course, for scholars of of Lothain or Galicanta. There were countless brilliant minds and peerless healers in the king’s court, yet Albrecht listened to none of them while planning his invasion of Lothain.

  The healers and seers, Moonsworn and otherwise, advised closing off the border immediately, to keep plague out. Albrecht began sending scouts across it instead.

  They advised keeping the semaphore lines open so that news of the Wrack might arrive, and the Moonsworn might coordinate a response. Albrecht instead cut off all outgoing semaphore messages and began sending raiding parties to destroy Lothain’s semaphores.

  They advised warning the populace to not drink the water of the Rhost River, which flowed through two Lothaini cities and alongside countless villages, in case the Wrack was transmitted by water. Instead, Albrecht began the construction of massive siege barges to be poled up the gentle river.

  The first few weeks of the invasion had gone swimmingly. They’d taken village after village, city after city, and none had offered even token resistance or even real complaint at having their crops and livestock seized. Albrecht’s ego had grown to even greater proportions than usual, and he’d seemed almost disappointed at having no battle to offer them.

  Ulric’s doubts had only grown and grown.