I cast another glance outside, desperately wanting to continue my hunt for Colm. But I couldn’t turn down Mona’s generosity, especially as I knew what it was costing her to treat Celeno as a guest and not a captive. And I had my suspicions that this was her way of making up for our tense discussion the night before. Reluctantly, I forced a grateful smile. “Thank you.”
We progressed up a staircase, where I found myself back in the same hall as the library. We headed to the opposite end, passing a bank of windows. I glanced again at the darkening sky, casting everything in shades of bitter gray—until a flash of light caught my eye. I peered down at the shoreline below.
“Something’s on fire,” I said in alarm as I peered through the rippled glass. “Oh—no, I’m sorry. It’s just Rou.”
Mona checked in place and pivoted to look out the window.
“I mean, he’s not on fire,” I said quickly. “He’s just doing that thing . . .”
She relaxed a little, her gaze fixed on him. “Spinning.”
I’d only seen Rou spinning his two flaming wicks once in Cyprien, when I was housed in a room that faced the dock. It seemed like a downright reckless practice to me, whirling flames on the ends of chains like he was hoping for maximum ignition power. But then, neither the River-folk nor the Lake-folk had the same kinds of wildfires we did in Alcoro every summer. I tried to relax, but despite Rou being surrounded by water and rapidly falling snow, I found I couldn’t.
“He’ll catch his death,” Ellamae said, looking casually out the window. “Can you imagine what a pain he’ll be if he’s sick in bed?”
Mona let out a little sigh. “No more than usual. He hates it here.”
“Oh, no, he doesn’t, Mona.”
“He does.” She straightened from the window. “I keep wondering when he’s going to snap and run off down the river.”
“Not any time soon, if we don’t mop up things in Cyprien,” she said. “But I get the feeling even one of those fancy fire grenades wouldn’t chase him from your side.”
She took a breath. “He’s an idiot.”
“I never said otherwise.”
I wondered if Ellamae’s sarcasm wasn’t making things worse. I remembered Mona’s tearful collapse in Cyprien after she’d tried to put Rou in his place, and I put my hand on her arm.
“He’s not going to leave out of the blue,” I said. “He’s too good-hearted for that. Besides, I get the sense he wants to stay with you for a long time.”
“He’s an idiot,” she said again, with a slight crack in her voice. “What is there for him here? Can either of you honestly see him as a king?”
We were both quiet.
“No,” she agreed. “Not because he wouldn’t be good—he would be, even though he says otherwise. He is systematically garnering the adoration of everyone in my country just on the merits of his smile alone. Honestly, I’ve never met a person so insufferably likable.” She shook her head down at him. “But he couldn’t be king of Lumen Lake because he would hate it.”
I watched him whirl his flames in twin circles over his head. “Well . . .”
“He would,” she insisted. “You heard him in his room last night. He passed it off as a joke, but there’s always a grain of truth in them. He’s committed to his own government, one run by his folk. Being shackled to a monarchy—and a foreign one at that—would drive him insane. And if I kept all the official responsibilities, and he was just a figurehead—he’d hate that more. Stuck here, away from Cyprien, unable to take part in the government he’s fought so hard to liberate, always under my exacting eye . . . he’d resent me within the year.”
“Have you asked him what he thinks?” I asked.
She was silent for a moment, watching him, a sort of distant sadness in her eyes.
“We go in circles,” she said. “First he argues that he doesn’t know how to be a king, that he doesn’t think he’d be a good one, while I counter him. And then we switch sides, and I argue that I can’t ask him to stay here and be something he doesn’t want to be.”
“And what does he say to that?” I asked.
“That he’d take it,” she said. “That it would be worth it.”
“Because he wants to be with you,” I agreed.
“I can’t trust that that will last,” she said in a rush. She turned fully to me. “Has it lasted for you?”
I blinked at her blunt question. Ellamae gave a short laugh. “What a thing to say, Mona—why don’t you just cut straight to the chase?”
“I’m serious, Mae.” Mona shifted her gaze to her. “You’re always going on about how you’re not a good monarch, all evidence to the contrary. Do you like being queen?”
Ellamae thought for a moment, her lips scrunched to one side. “Yes,” she finally said. “I mean, the etiquette and the expectations of the court can kiss my boots, but I like being queen. I like that I’m still a Woodwalker along with it. I like that I can finally fix the damage from Val’s father.”
Mona looked back to me. “Do you like being queen?”
I eyed her. “I’d have expected you to argue that liking it isn’t the point.”
“It’s not,” she said. “But you both had the choice of taking up the crown. I didn’t. And now I’m suddenly facing the reality of asking another person to make that decision, and I’m wondering why on earth he’d want to.”
“Part of it is marrying the person you love,” I said.
“Part, but not all,” she replied.
I studied the circle of fire down below. Rou had brought the wicks in closer to his body, spinning them front to back.
“I used to like being queen,” I said. “Once upon a time, I really, truly used to. I liked making decisions, and having a hand in things—like you, Ellamae. But somewhere along the line, that got lost, and it became a dance around the Prophecy. I lost the ability to do things myself. Decisions that should have been straightforward became webs of religion and motive. Everything had to be done in Celeno’s name, or else it was worthless.” I looked back at them. “Now I don’t think it’s as simple as like or dislike. But it doesn’t matter, because I’m not the queen anymore.”
“Not yet, anyway,” Mona said. “But I’m of the same mind—there’s nothing simple about it. Queen is what I am. It’s what I was raised to do, and it’s not something I have the luxury of liking or disliking. I can’t not be queen. And not just because I can’t undo the title—I don’t know anything else.”
“Oh, sure you do,” Ellamae said, seemingly wanting to lighten the mood. “You can dive and sail and write a mean treaty, and you know how to match your breeches and tunics.”
Mona flicked her disapproving gaze once more over Ellamae’s wardrobe.
“It’s not that I mind dressing up,” Ellamae said. “I just hate feeling like I can’t react if something were to go wrong. Call it a product of exile, if you like.”
“We’re in one of the safest places in my country,” Mona said, gesturing around. “What do you expect to have to react to?”
Ellamae tossed up her hands. “Rogue otters and renegade herons, or labyrinthine passages at the very least. Though I admit I mostly dress to piss you off now.”
Mona rolled her eyes. “Well, at least some thought went into it.” She sighed and waved a hand down the hall. “Come on, Gemma, let’s get your measurements. Be careful, Mae, I might have them take yours.”
“I’ll fight you,” Ellamae threatened.
Smiling again at their strange—but strong—relationship, I followed Mona, leaving our talk of kings and queens behind at the frosty window.
By the time the tailor had taken my measurements, fitted me for shoes, and discussed accessories with Mona—and after Ellamae had adopted a sparring crouch at the tailor’s approach—it was lunchtime. I couldn’t turn down their invitation to eat, my stomach growling again as if breakfast had never existed. When lunch was finished, Mona suggested having another round of diplomatic talks now that we’d all had a chance to rest.
I managed to request an hour, explaining that I was still tired from the journey, and excused myself. I hurried through the Blackshell corridors until I finally found the entrance hall.
I was an idiot—the brewing storm had worsened since morning, and I was still only wearing the little knitted shawl. Not wanting to waste the time to return for a cloak, I trudged through the whistling wind with my head down and my arms pulled tight across my chest, looking up only to squint for the tops of the masts sticking up above the roofline.
My main concern, once I’d found the shipyard, was how I was going to find Colm amid the maze of dry docks and slipways. But I shouldn’t have worried. As I approached the first ship, its sides cloaked in scaffolding, I caught snatches of song borne on the gusts of wind. Like the morning before—had it really only been a day since the cave?—I followed the voices. Shivering, I rounded the stern of a ship’s skeleton and looked up.
Where all the other ships were empty, one was buzzing with activity. Folk clung to the yardarms, balancing on foot ropes and hoisting up the massive sails that were snapping in the wind. I stared up, my head spinning at the tilt of the three masts, but the shipwrights didn’t seem fazed by it. They sang a song with a repeating refrain, with a dogged beat just the right tempo to pull in the rigging.
Buckles of brass and bearings of tin,
Haul away, mates, each your line.
It’s weather ahead and the yards must come in.
Heave away, mates, and haul down.
I scanned the activity for Colm and found him on the deck, working a rope as thick as my wrist. His stance was spread wide, and he reached arm over arm in time with the others, his sleeves rolled to his elbows despite the snow.
A hot mug of this and a tall pint of that,
Haul away, mates, each your line.
Finish your work ’fore she blows herself flat.
Heave away, mates, and haul down.
I headed toward the ship, Wild Indigo painted on its side in bright yellow script, hoping to find an incongruous spot to wait where I wouldn’t be picked out by curious workers. It took me a moment to realize I wasn’t the only person approaching the dock—as the space narrowed, I came up on another figure, hurrying with his cloak hood thrown back. As I neared him, I recognized the strap across the back of his head.
Arlen.
I approached on his left side, unthinking, and rather than turning over his left shoulder, he pivoted around his right, fixing me with his uncovered eye.
“Oh,” he said, surprised. “Queen Gemma.”
“Hello,” I said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“No, I just didn’t expect—what are you doing here?”
“I was hoping to find Colm,” I said.
“He’s here?” He craned his head, but by this point, we were below sight of the deck, with only the rigging visible.
“On deck, on one of the lines,” I said. “Why, what are you here for?”
It was only when he fidgeted uncomfortably that I realized it was a personal question. He looked up, his gaze searching and then locking on someone high up in the rigging.
“I figured they’d have to take the yards in, with this wind coming in,” he said. “They only just got the last one hung yesterday, so I thought . . .”
I tried to move the conversation in a different direction. “It seems awfully late in the season to be hanging sails?”
Unfortunately, it didn’t ease his discomfort. “Ah, well, normally we’d stop before the winds change in November, but Mona wanted us to push through, in case . . .”
Oh, right. In the very real event of having to defend the lake from an Alcoran attack. I decided not to try to direct the conversation any more.
I’ve someone who’s waiting with eye on the storm.
Haul away, mates, each your line.
We’ll weather far worse if we stand it alone.
Heave away, mates, and haul down.
Surreptitiously I followed Arlen’s gaze up to one of the distant topsails, where three people balanced on the foot ropes—a young, scrawny boy, a burly man with a braided beard, and a woman with thick curly hair held out of her face by a red kerchief. Theirs was one of the last sails in place, the buckles tightened and the straps cinched. The final haul down! sounded, followed by a whistle, high and long. The curly-headed woman edged along the yardarm and swung one-handed onto the shrouds.
Arlen sucked in a breath. “I hate it when she does that.”
The ship’s sails secure, the wrights all began to filter off the boat and down to the dock. Some of them nodded to Arlen or touched their caps. A few gazes landed on me, jumping from my relatively darker complexion to the outlandish headband in my hair. They recognized the look of my folk, and most of them cut their eyes away, or furrowed their brows. I tried to shrink behind Arlen.
Colm appeared at the rail, swinging a cloak around his broad shoulders. He looked down and saw us, his gaze locking on mine for a long second before sliding to Arlen. He looked over his shoulder and gestured for the curly-haired woman to go in front of him. She descended the gangplank, pinning her own cloak, her cheeks reddened by the cold. Her eyes lit up when she saw Arlen waiting for her.
“Oh,” she said, clearly pleased. “You didn’t have to come!”
He shuffled a bit. “I just thought, ah . . . you forgot your hat. The other day.”
He held out a knit cap.
“That’s not my hat,” she said. “That’s your hat.”
“Oh, is it?” He shoved it back in his cloak pocket without looking at it. “I guess I only . . . I was a little worried, with the wind.”
She stood on her toes and kissed him warmly. Despite his embarrassment, it seemed, he threaded his arms under hers. Where her fingers clutched his collar, she wore a heavy seal ring made of mother-of-pearl, carved with the same crossed rushes I’d seen in the royal portraits. Arlen must have given his to her.
“Sorcha’s the most sure-footed sail rat of the bunch,” Colm said, joining us. “It’d take more than mere gale-force winds to shake her off the lines.”
“That’s what comes from being stuck up there nine hours a day for three years,” she said, pulling away from Arlen. She turned square to me and looked me up and down without a hint of abashment. “Which I suppose I have you to thank for.”
I blinked in astonishment. Arlen cleared his throat with force. “Ah, er, Sorcha . . .”
“No lectures, thanks,” she said to him. “I was here. You weren’t.” She eyed my star band. “Your folk always used to have problems with their topsails snapping their lines. They thought they had a bad length of cord. You know what it really was?”
“What?” I asked, thinking I probably already knew.
“I filed halfway through the filaments every time we hung a new yard,” she said. “They wasted more time on repairs for the Mallow than any other ship in the fleet.”
“We’re all working toward a truce now,” Arlen said a little too loudly.
“I bet we are,” she said. She flipped her cloak hood over her strawberry curls. “Meanwhile, in the real world, I’m famished for a bowl of bean soup.”
She strode off toward the main road back to Blackshell. Arlen gave me an apologetic glance, his hands spread imploringly as he turned to follow.
“I’m sorry,” Colm said behind me. “I won’t do Sorcha the disservice of asking you not to take it to heart, but . . .”
“No, actually . . .” Her words hadn’t stung me as much as I thought—and as I was sure she’d hoped they would. I turned to look up at him. “I’d be interested to hear what else she has to say. Do you think she’d talk to me?”
“Probably, but be careful what you wish for.” He went to put up his hood and paused. “Where’s your cloak?”
“I, well . . .” I could have kicked myself, realizing I was still bunched into a shivering ball against the wind. “Oh, no, Colm, please don’t, really . . .”
But the clasp was already undone. H
e slid it from his shoulders and held it out to me. His own seal ring flashed under the cloudy sky, shadowing the two crossed rushes.
I shook my head, trying to keep my teeth from audibly chattering, feeling like the world’s biggest fool. “Please don’t.”
“I’m roasting, honestly—that line was no shoestring.”
I bit my lip and unearthed one of my hands to lift it from him. It was less fine than the embroidered one from the day before, dark gray with no embellishments, but it was tightly woven and waterproof. Reddening a little, I pulled it around my shoulders—and tried not to sigh with contentment as it settled around me.
“Thank you,” I said, tucking up the long hem so it wouldn’t trail.
“We’ll get you one of your own back at Blackshell,” he said. He nodded after Arlen and Sorcha’s retreating backs. “Let’s get inside.”
We set off through the snow. The last few shipwrights hurried along with us toward the main road. They all touched their caps or their chests as they passed Colm, like they had with Arlen. He nodded back, greeting many of them by name.
I searched for a topic safe to discuss among happenstance listeners. “Why do you come to the shipyard? Just something to do?”
“Something useful to do,” he said. “Mona hopes to double our fleet by spring, so the call went out for all able bodies. Besides, it’s gratifying to have a hand in building something tangible.”
“What was that song everyone was singing?”
“A chanty, just one of many—most of them are like that, where one caller sings the verses and everyone else joins in on the repeats. It means they can be changed up with the job or weather and sung over and over again. You’d be hard-pressed to find a quiet deck these days.”
“Because my folk outlawed singing,” I said, deciding it was best to acknowledge it.
He tilted his head as we caught up to Arlen and Sorcha. “Yes, I suppose it is.”
“This was all so much simpler in my head,” I said. “Now I see there were a million things I didn’t take into account.”
“Everything is simpler before it happens,” he agreed.
Creatures of Light, Book 3 Page 23
