The Secret's Keeper and the Heir

by Jackie McCarthy

  “With Lucy?” Dunstan spoke before he could stop himself. “I mean, um, with Miss Helayna?”

  “Ah, but you’ve met,” asked the Master, happy to have stumbled upon an interesting change of subject.

  “Of course,” Dunstan said before he could stop himself. “She was…” His own lack of words stopped him. She was…what? At the ball? Wearing a ridiculous pink frock? Willing to fight back with dignity and poise at unfair treatment? The most adorable blend of fire and feeling he’d ever encountered?

  “She was…?” Lorey prompted.

  “She was…” Dunstan considered again, his thoughts trailing off in directions he didn’t wish his father to follow.

  “Ah,” whispered the old Master, smiling to himself. “She was. I see.”

  * * * * *

  The sea below transitioned from light blue to impenetrable black as the Turnagain and its crew passed beyond the shore. The bustle of a dozen or so shiphands during their launch had subsided. The men settled back into their daily routines.

  Captain Kaille stood at the ship’s bow, his hand upon the pulpit rail and his gaze far distant. He considered the ship and his place upon it. The mantel of Captain wasn’t a thing to be taken lightly. Though he tried to surround himself with able hands, he was nonetheless the primary person in charge of his vessel’s safety. Both the ship and its men had been entrusted to his care, and he took his responsibility seriously.

  It pained Kaille to no end that sometimes, as a part of his leadership duties, he would have to be the arbiter of mariner justice. The lifestyle at sea required strict rules and unspoken laws that couldn’t be bent for any man. A moment’s pain in upholding them was nothing compared to the suffering that might result from letting them pass uncorrected.

  Two pairs of footsteps could be heard approaching. Kaille sighed. It was time.

  “Ye wanted to talk to me, Captain?” asked Auk. He walked ahead of Benson Rose, who’d been tasked with bringing the oily Second discreetly.

  “Aye, come here Auk,” said Kaille, guiding the greasy man into the carved outline of the Eye. “A troublesome rumor reached me this evening, one which I couldn’t ignore.”

  “I’ll help how I’m able, Captain,” said the Second, his nervous eyes flicking towards the shipboy.

  Rose couldn’t help but quail under his glance. She watched the two sailors with a strange mixture of emotion. Her heart still felt a quickened beat—excitement that the Captain had called to her—proof that he didn’t think any less of her for breaking his shiphand’s nose. Yet…the set of Kaille’s jaw was now firm and his shoulders tense. His posture told her this encounter was to be grave.

  Auk took his last steps forward with an air of submission, sensing that something was wrong.

  “Auk,” began the Captain with some reticence, “you’re aware that superstitions come from a place of truth, aye?”

  “Well, sure Captain,” said Auk carefully. “That makes sense.”

  “So, when we say, for instance, that having a woman aboard brings a curse upon the ship,” Kaille said, throwing out an example that made Rose’s heart skip a frightened beat, “it’s in some ways an easier way of saying that having women around makes things more complicated?”

  More complicated? Rose’s eyes flew nervously between the Captain and his Second. A curse upon the ship?

  “I…I suppose,” Auk said. “I’ve only ever heard of a curse, but I suppose if there wasn’t, having a woman aboard would still be awfully difficult.”

  “A woman as a sailor is an absurd thought,” said the Captain. Rose felt her brow crease in silent disapproval, though she attempted to betray no particular feeling to this conversation. She found it harder to remain still as his lecture continued, however. “They’re not strong enough—not smart enough—not crude enough to fit in with a crew of men. Women as companions would be fine, I suppose, if there were enough to go around, but men become irrational around the fairer sex: they fight, they feel, they try to impress. Just imagine what would happen if a woman were to be discovered aboard. There’s no telling what kind of violence might ensue as men gave into their basest urges and fought to be with her, likely against her will.”

  Rose couldn’t keep herself still any longer. She shuffled uncomfortably. Neither man so much as looked at her, which was the only kindness that kept her from diving headlong off the bow of the ship. Had the Captain asked her to be present for this because he wanted her to hear it? Had she been too intimate in the carriage? Had he discovered her disguise? Would they turn on her at any moment with their swords drawn, determined to destroy the female before she had a chance to curse them all?

  Rose thought she might be sick. The ship’s gentle bobbing upon the waves brought bile to her throat, which she swallowed with great difficulty. Her rapid heart beat loudly in her ears.

  “That all makes fine sense, Captain,” Auk said sensibly, his attempts to remain upbeat increasing Rose’s sense of unease.

  “Now consider,” said Kaille carefully, “if the trouble of bringing a female lover aboard was magnified tenfold by the act of making lovers of other men?”

  Rose, mere moments from losing the contents of her queasy stomach, felt a sudden shift. All the fluids trying to escape her throat then plummeted instead like a stone into her gut. She reeled back from the impact.

  Captain Kaille hadn’t called her there to expose her as a woman, after all. He’d called her there to expose Auk as a…as a what? She’d yet to understand the damning nature of her testimony against the ship’s overbearing Second. Her lack of understanding made the act of speaking against him feel despicably wrong.

  Rose knew she couldn’t follow a shipman’s course of work without also adopting their ideology, however. If everyone kept telling her that Auk’s romance with another man was the kind of thing that brought ill luck upon the ship, then perhaps it was. At the same time, she too had just been unknowingly accused of an equally terrible crime. If the Captain was right about Auk, was he also right that a woman could bring down a curse upon their ship?

  For his part, Auk’s forehead glistened with anxious sweat. “C-Captain?” he stammered.

  “A rumor has reached me that you’ve been engaged in inappropriate behavior with your fellow crew member,” Kaille said, voicing the accusation in its entirety. He motioned to Rose as a corroborator, but she averted her eyes in shame. “How long has this been going on, Auk?”

  “I,” the oily man blubbered, “nay, I’d never—”

  “Don’t lie to me,” said the Captain. “I’ve trusted you with my ship and crew. It would harm me deeply if that trust were to be misplaced.”

  “But I didn’t—” Auk sputtered. “It wasn’t nothing harmful—”

  Rose felt a shift in the wind. Hair whipped at her face, and she shivered in the chill. Looking down at the carved Eye in fear, she wondered if the sea god had just passed judgment on them. She knew, without understanding, that the greasy man had just damned himself. It felt like the sea knew as well.

  “You know the superstitions well enough,” said Kaille, his voice gaining strength from anger. “You know what fate is said to befall the ships on which one man lies with another.”

  Auk looked pained, his breath ragged. “Aye, but—”

  “And do you wish that fate upon the Turnagain?” Kaille demanded.

  The Captain’s fury burned hot and Rose felt herself blister with guilt. If Auk’s crime was to knowingly engage in actions believed to bring a curse upon the ship, then she was most definitely blameworthy as well. Her mere presence was an affront to the customs and taboos that made shipboard life possible. Did staying aboard mean she wished ill upon the crew, as Kaille now said of his Second?

  “Of course not!” Auk cried in answer to their shared dilemma.

  “Good,” said the Captain coolly, having waited for such a denial. “Then you’ll understand why I let Nial go before we left port.”

  The bile returned to Rose’s throat as she watched Auk’s he
art break in front of her.

  “Ye what?” he wailed, his savage eyes turning back to shore. “Nay! Nay, ye couldn’t!”

  To Rose’s relief, the broken Auk jerked himself from the bow and ran blindly aft, his plea repeated to the gusting winds. She collapsed upon the rail and gasped in great breaths, grasping once more at her bruised throat, which was now strangled with emotion. She saw the Captain take off after the sobbing Second, and, through her tears, discerned that she was supposed to follow.

  They chased him to the aft rail where Auk threw himself bodily into the sturdy wooden barrier holding him back from the sea. His face streamed with snot and tears as he turned to demand, “Ye must turn round!” He pummeled the rail again and again. “Please, Captain—”

  “I considered leaving both of you,” Kaille informed the broken mess of a man. “But for your sake, I thought it best to remove your…temptation. If you wish to continue working as a sailor, this is a…a habit…that needs breaking.”

  Auk shook his head, his limbs shaking for lack of air. “Please turn round,” he said plaintively. “I beg ye. I love him, Captain. I beg ye.”

  Rose clasped her hands upon her own grief-ridden face, and she watched the Captain through her fingers. He was disappointed by Auk’s response, she could see, and his jaw worked against the yell he held in.

  “You may swim back to shore if you’d rather choose to live this crime,” said the Captain dismissively, as though he no longer cared if his Second lived or died. “Our journey turns for no man.”

  The Captain’s fiery glare fell upon Rose. She held her hands tightly over her sobbing face. Though she tried to meet Kaille’s ire-filled eyes, Auk spoke four final words in a voice so heart-wrenching that she could suffer it no longer.

  “But I can’t swim…” he whimpered, looking desperately back to shore.

  Rose turned on her heals and threw up over the side of the ship.

  She didn’t know how she felt about the idea of a man loving another man. She hadn’t cared to think about how such things even worked. What she did know was that Auk, who now stood at the ship’s rail like a man half-dead, was actively considering whether or not to throw himself from the ship and into certain death rather than live without the person he loved. She knew how he felt, and wondered daily what rash actions she might take if told the location of her lost brother.

  Rose’s heart bled for the greasy Second. She leaned back on the rail, wiping a rough hand against her dripping mouth, and looked up to see the Captain watching her with concern. He seemed to almost regret his actions, his eyes betraying the heartbreak he felt in causing another person such pain.

  Upon finding himself under inspection, however, the Captain hid this display of humanity. “You, Benson Rose,” he commanded, “you’ll take Cricket’s place as shiphand. You’ve done well.”

  Despite the regret she’d seen in his eyes, Rose cowered from the Captain’s praise. She felt her stomach heave to release its contents once more, and she turned back to the sea, choking upon her own guilt and fear.

  * * * * *

  For once, Sara was happy when her Landlord called upon them. She was eager to hear news of Haskal Brockhammond. So it was that when a knock came at the door, she answered it excitedly.

  “Has Haskal called?” she demanded of Pella.

  “Be thankful that he hasn’t,” said Pella, pushing his way inside. “And pray to your canyon gods that he’s forgotten you.”

  Sara’s heart, which had raced all day at the thought of the nobleman’s son, was stilled immediately by the Landlord’s sour words. “Why would I pray for that? He’s a fine lord and master of this city,” Sara said. “He’s a credit to—”

  “Have you seen this city?” Pella demanded. “It’s full of poverty and fear. That should tell you all you need to know about any Brockhammond.”

  Sara crossed her arms and looked at him angrily. “What would you know? You came from a jungle where you lived in boats,” she said dismissively.

  “And you come from a desert where you made a living from boats,” Pella said rudely. “The question is two sided.”

  “Kentshore isn’t a desert—” Sara began to argue.

  Tobi pushed at her sister. “You always fight, Sara,” she said in her disapproving child’s voice. “He’s my friend and I want to hear a jungle story.”

  “A jungle story, little one?” asked Pella, taken aback. “I don’t know any.”

  “Everyone knows stories,” Tobi insisted, rushing to her mother’s feet. She grabbed her Mama’s cold hand and looked at their landlord, face eager with anticipation.

  Pella gave Sara one last, measuring look, then went to sit opposite the girl and her mother. He examined the pair thoughtfully and turned his gaze to the fire.

  Sara was about to leave the room, but then he began to speak.

  “There were once two banya trees that grew very tall,” he said. “Banya trees are rare, you see, and so they were the joy of the village of Larami, for they reached halfway to the sun and carried their people’s prayers up and up, and into the court of the Sun King. That’s why the people called them Prayer Trees.

  “The reason these fine trees could grow so tall was because the village had been blessed. For many years it had been home to the most beautiful spirit of the four winds, named Rama, who brought the banya seeds from far away. She danced around the trees every day, helping them grow strong. She would smile upon them and call their ancient names, ‘Titania grow, you marvelous thing. Uciva up, and let your heart sing!’ The village of Larami fell deeply in love with their wind spirit, and they were happy for many years.

  “If a village has only ten people in it, however,” said Pella darkly, “it can be guaranteed that one of the ten will harbor a greedy soul. In a larger village, as was Larami, there were several such men, who loved their Prayer Trees but couldn’t hear the song of Rama. The leader’s name was Pio. When all the other villagers joined in the joyous dance, Pio and his men would take their boats to the mouth of the river and wait.

  “After a time, from their place upriver, they’d begin to hear laughter. As they waited, the cackling jackals would appear, first one and then another, until there were seven in all. They would gently make their way from branch to branch, their mottled fur reflected in the water below. In their reflection, however, they looked like snakes. From their perches above, the jackals would surround the men in their boats, and they’d talk of things near and far, their harsh laughter peeling through the forest.

  “The jackals rarely brought up the subject of Larami’s prayer trees, but when they did, they would point out that Larami, located upon a deep bend in the river, was an unhealthy spot for the coveted banya trees. ‘They grow tall while still saplings,’ said the Jackal Kisko, ‘but as they get older the roots will become waterlogged and they’ll slowly die. They might grow well in other villages, but no one will want them once they’re old, you must sell them now.’

  “Pio and the greedy men, who were eager to keep their precious prayer trees in good health but also excited by the prospect of easy gold, saw the wisdom in this. Next time the council of elders met, the topic of moving the trees was brought up.

  “’The trees are young still,’ said June, ‘how can we tell if they would even want to move? Let’s ask Rama, she’ll know what to do.’

  “’Why would you ask a wind spirit?’ demanded Pio. ‘What does she know about water and roots? We’re the Keepers of the River Forest, we must do what is best for us and the Sun King.’

  “’There are things more important than the Sun King,’ argued Kri. ‘We’ve nurtured these prayer trees. They depend on us.’

  “’You should be drowned with your canoe!’ yelled Tippi. ‘There’s nothing more important than the Sun King!’

  “Eventually, the council agreed to appeal to Rama’s wisdom. ‘You can’t move them to the jackal’s home,’ she said. ‘The water’s putrid there. They won’t survive.’

  “Trees survive everywhe
re. We are, after all, in a forest,’ said Pio.

  “The village of Larami grieved, but they agreed with Pio that the future of their banyas was of the utmost importance. They decided to sell the tallest tree, Titania. The men worked day and night for several days, diving deep into the river forest and digging up Titania’s roots. There was a procession of boats that floated the tree through the woods, its branches veiled against the grasping forest. They knew they approached the jackal’s roundabout because the laughter grew louder. Shivers were sent up the spines of many in the procession, but they knew the jackals couldn’t help being what they were. With heavy hearts, the people of Larami transferred care of Titania, and turned their boats around.

  “Many months later, the Jackals invited Pio for dinner. As he approached their town in his canoe, he saw the prayer tree at its center. To his relief, Titania seemed to be doing very well. The tree had flowered prettily and had grown stouter. Pio was pleased and took this news back to Larami. On hearing that their prayer tree was thriving, they agreed that it would be best to move the other as well.

  “Rama objected at once. ‘I forbid it! Uciva was always smaller. She’s precious to me and mustn’t be sold!’

  “Pio, angry at the wind spirit’s presumptions, pulled back a fist and dealt her a heavy blow. ‘The prayer trees aren’t yours, and they thrive elsewhere. They belong to Larami. They were your gift, and a gift is no longer your property. They’re not yours to keep or dispose of.’

  “’Uciva is too young,’ roared the spirit. ‘You can’t do this!’

  “’How long do we wait, then?’ demanded Pio. ‘Until Uciva is old and no one wants it? Until our deep waters have caused it to rot and decay?’

  “’Uciva won’t rot and decay if we love it,’ said the spirit.

  “’All things rot and decay. Even wind spirits,’ Pio said spitefully. ‘Especially this one.’

  “Rama rushed at him, devastated by his words, but Pio was stronger. They struggled, a battle of wind and body, until Pio took out his broad knife and chopped off the head of the rebellious wind spirit.