by Amy Neftzger
“Whether the decision was the correct one remains to be seen,” Taro said. “However, disobedience often discredits the one who displays it, so we’re better off if we put this behind us and move forward. It doesn’t help us, the guardians, or the mission of the orphanage to argue. In the end, the king will decide what was right or wrong. Until he makes a change in management, we will respect those he has placed in charge.”
“Taro, were we just fired from the lab?” Nicholas asked quietly.
“No,” Taro replied. He thought carefully and then added, “You were promoted to the garden.”
Nicholas was unconvinced: “It doesn’t feel like a promotion.”
Chapter Eighteen
Crossing the Sea
At the entrance to the docks stood a beautiful woman dressed in green silk. She looked out of place in her elegantly flowing gown, matching parasol, and long string of pearls. She strongly resembled the woman in amethyst and the woman in blue. She even had the same hand motions as she fingered her pearls, toying with them constantly.
“I’m beginning to think that this is the same woman but with a very large wardrobe,” Kelsey said with suspicion.
“I told you,” Megan replied. “They’re sisters.”
“They look identical. They all stare down their noses at me in the same manner, and they have the same attitude.”
“It couldn’t be the same person unless she had a way to travel quickly from one place to another,” Roland interjected. “Besides, I’ve seen them together so I know that there are at least a dozen of them.”
“A dozen?”
“More than a dozen. They’re everywhere and in the most unlikely places. That’s actually how you can tell them apart. Each one is drawn to a different location, and each has a unique color.”
“Hello, young man!” the woman exclaimed with excitement as soon as she saw Silence.
“They always like him,” Kelsey remarked with disgust. Just when she was beginning to soften towards the kid, he had charmed another one of these haughty women.
“Of course they would like him,” Roland answered quietly. “He lets them do most of the talking.” Kelsey appreciated Roland’s perspective on the situation, and it made her feel better that there was nothing wrong with her.
Kelsey spotted the brilliant green of the woman’s eyes as the woman looked up. They were like two clear, round emeralds without flaws. Her pupils were only slightly darker green than the iris, making her eyes look even more like precious stones. When she blinked and the green disappeared, Kelsey felt the need to rush forward and catch the falling jewel before it hit the ground, but there was nothing to catch. The woman’s eyes opened again to reveal the beautiful, clear green right where it had always been.
“Your eyes,” Kelsey started to say, but then she realized that she didn’t know what to say.
“The eyes are the window to the soul,” the woman stated tritely.
“They’re beautiful.”
“Then I must be a beautiful person!” The woman in green laughed at her own joke.
“You are a beautiful person,” Roland insisted with a polite bow. “Like all of your sisters. You are each uniquely exquisite, and it is always wonderful to see you.”
“Roland, you flatter me,” she replied with a smile and then waited for him to continue. When she called him by name, Kelsey knew the woman was already familiar with Roland, but did she fully understand Roland’s occupation? She might simply know him because of his travels and having seen him on this road before. Kelsey noted the woman had recognized him despite the disguise of the hat, scarf, and glasses. After a short pause in the conversation, the woman turned to thank an old man who dropped a few spare coins into the paper bag at her feet.
“How often do you see your sisters?” Kelsey asked, still wondering if this was really one woman with a huge wardrobe of different colored dresses.
“We cross paths,” the woman replied. She wasn’t as harsh as the other two women had been, but Kelsey wouldn’t call her friendly, either. The woman in green studied Kelsey for a moment and then glanced at Silence before turning to Kelsey again and carefully looking her over. “Aren’t you the girl who lost control of the bad memories and then fell into the pepper melons? My sister told me about that.” Now Kelsey was positive the woman wasn’t friendly.
“Yes,” Kelsey admitted, but she refrained from saying anything more, hoping that the topic of discussion would quickly end.
“You don’t like anyone bringing that up, do you?”
“It’s embarrassing.”
“It would be,” the woman agreed. “But the past won’t go away. Better to own up to it.”
“It’s still embarrassing.”
“But the more you own up to it, the less you’ll feel the sting,” the woman said. “And the less it can hurt you.”
Kelsey didn’t know what to say to this, but she thought the most appropriate thing to do would be to thank the woman in green for the advice. The woman smiled pleasantly at her afterward, and Kelsey decided to quit talking while she was ahead. She glanced up at the sky to see that clouds were beginning to form overhead.
“We’re about to cross the sea,” Roland suddenly announced. “Would you have any guidance for us?”
“Don’t let them see your face.”
“That goes without saying,” he replied.
“The sea doesn’t like to be crossed, but then again, nobody does,” she continued. “It’s in an unpleasant mood, but you may be able to calm it with a story.”
“Thank you, sister,” he said with a bow. “We appreciate your guidance.” He turned to leave. Kelsey also said goodbye and quickly followed Roland. Megan and Silence remained behind for a moment to continue talking.
“She wasn’t as bad as the others,” Kelsey remarked when she and Roland were out of the woman’s earshot.
“Perhaps she’s the same as the others and the difference is that you’ve changed,” Roland suggested. Kelsey thought for a moment before responding.
“She didn’t argue with you, either.”
“Almost no one argues with Death,” he replied. “Especially not the descendants of Wisdom. They, above all, know that it would be pointless.”
The pair stepped out onto the pier and walked across it until they came to a row of ships. Roland studied them for what seemed to be a long time. Silence and Megan caught up as Roland was still contemplating the ships, and Kelsey saw Silence holding a few coins. The woman in green had given Silence the money for passage. She fought the urge to be jealous, but it was difficult because things seemed so easy for him. Being homeless made his life difficult, but people seemed to like him and they gave him money when he needed it.
As the group stood looking up and down at their options for travel, a few more clouds moved in overhead, and it began to rain softly. Kelsey glanced at Silence, but he didn’t seem to mind the shower. She, however, didn’t care for getting wet. She worried about her knife and wondered if it had been oiled enough to prevent rust.
“Let’s take the blue and white ship over there,” Kelsey suggested, trying to speed along the process. She tried to read the name on the side through the misting rain. “It looks like it’s called ‘The Happy Traveler.’”
“Not that one,” Roland said dismissively. “It’s going to sink in less than two days. Everyone on board will die.”
“How can you ...” Kelsey started to ask, but then she realized that Roland probably saw things that she didn’t. “In that case, which one do you recommend?”
“The one where the crew isn’t going to mutiny and murder the captain on the next voyage,” he announced as he looked at a bright red ship next to The Happy Traveler. “That one over there will lose half the crew and passengers in the process.”
“Can you see the future?” Kelsey asked.
“Not exactly,” Roland replied. “I can see time and I can smell endings. Together I can make a pretty good guess at which ship will get us there safely.”
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“Which one is that?”
“Either the Endora Wave or the Portly Mermaid,” Roland answered. Kelsey looked at them both and saw that the Endora Wave was a shorter walk down the pier, and so she chose it. She paid the passage fee and boarded with Silence, but the clerk didn’t seem to notice either Roland or Megan. It was as if they were ghosts. They strolled aboard without being asked for a ticket.
“Sometimes I think the sorcerer’s spell can work to our advantage,” Kelsey remarked to Silence when she saw the giant snow leopard curled up on a corner of the deck without drawing any attention. The boy nodded with an expression that told Kelsey that he had seen similar things and more in the past.
They didn’t have to wait long until the ship left port, and they started the voyage in good spirits. The sea was a little choppy, but not too rough. Kelsey was happy to finally be moving forward without having to walk. She hadn’t realized how tired her legs had become, and the period of rest was welcome. Silence happily conversed with a few birds and seemed to have forgotten his experience with the crow. Roland stared down whole schools of fish and they would float up dead to the surface of the water, where Megan could easily scoop them out and devour them. For the first time in their journey, they had plenty of rest and plenty of food.
However, after a few days on the water, the sea became rougher, and the ship began tossing back and forth, often lurching unexpectedly. Roland became listless and started drooling as he lay motionless on the windy deck.
“Are you OK, Roland?” Kelsey asked with concern. He didn’t look well. In fact, he almost looked green underneath his lush, red fur. His abnormally lethargic disposition and pale coloring had Kelsey wondering if Death could possibly die.
“I don’t do well in rough water,” he explained as he sluggishly rolled over. “I think I’m having hot flashes.” A few minutes later, he looked chilled.
“Can I do anything to help?” Kelsey asked sympathetically. She really did like him, and it bothered her to see him ill.
“It’s just seasickness. It will pass when the water calms again.”
“Death gets seasick?”
“We all have our flaws,” Roland replied weakly. “Mine could be far worse, if you think about it.” Kelsey agreed and dropped the subject. She went over to Megan, who had been snatching fish out of the water with her claws. However, the waves were so violent that they often tossed the fish out of her grasp before she could scoop the potential meal onto the deck. Her usual fishing strategy was useless under the current conditions.
“This was much easier with Roland’s help,” Megan complained.
“Roland is very sick,” Kelsey said.
“I know. He always gets sick on the rough sea.”
“Can you heal him?”
“I could if he wanted to be healed.”
“Of course, he does!”
“No, he doesn’t,” Megan said. “Roland wants to endure it.”
“No one wants to vomit for days on end.”
“Roland does,” Megan insisted as she finally scooped another fish onto the deck. She smacked the fish on the head to keep it from flopping around and quickly shoved it into her mouth. “Well,” she said with her mouth still full, “it’s not that he enjoys the sickness, exactly. It’s more that he enjoys enduring it. He doesn’t want to escape the discomfort because it helps him to remember what people go through right before death. In a way, it reminds him of what it’s like to feel human.”
“He told you this?”
“He didn’t have to.”
“Then how do you know it’s true?”
“Because I know Roland,” she explained, wiping her mouth with the back of her paw. Then she examined the fur on the back of her paw for a moment before licking it clean. “Look,” she continued as she flopped back down on the deck, “Roland is in a job where he takes life. It’s easy to become hardened to what people are feeling when they’re facing that sort of a dramatic change. This is the one thing that Roland experiences that helps him to understand what people are going through when they die. It’s not easy, and it’s very uncomfortable to make a change. Roland likes to be reminded of what that discomfort feels like. So let him enjoy his illness, and let’s catch some more fish.” Megan stood up again and leaned over the side of the ship, stretching out her massive paw over the waves that continued to slop up against the side.
Kelsey glanced over at Roland. She could see his eyes closed underneath the sunglasses and hoped he was sleeping. He looked smaller now. Illness has a way of removing a person’s stature, and Kelsey didn’t like seeing Roland this way. She turned her head just in time to see one of the crew members trying to coax Silence below deck. Kelsey jumped up and ran across to where they were struggling.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“Our cabin boy is seasick and we need someone in the galley to do chores,” the sailor replied as Silence slipped out of the sailor’s grasp. “The mute here would be helpful.”
“He paid his fare as a passenger.” Kelsey took another cautious step closer to Silence.
“He’s only a boy, and by the looks of him, he doesn’t have a family.”
“He’s with me. I’m his family,” Kelsey replied with anger in her voice as she pulled Silence away from the man. She glanced over at Megan, but the leopard was frantically grasping for fish and didn’t seem to notice. Kelsey called out to her, but the leopard couldn't hear or see anything but the waves sweeping the fish out of her grasp.
“You both look like runaways,” the sailor remarked. “You’ve been staying on deck this whole trip and avoiding the rest of the passengers and crew.”
“It doesn’t matter where we stay if we paid our passage,” Kelsey insisted. The sailor took a step forward and stared her down. He wasn’t going to let a girl stop him, and Kelsey could see this.
“Megan!” she screamed, but the leopard still couldn’t hear her over the sound of the wind. “Megan! Help!”
The sailor moved forward and reached out to capture Silence again. The boy dodged his grasp and started running, but the sailor caught up with him near where Roland was resting in a disorganized lump on a lounge chair.
“I’ve got you!” the sailor screamed as he reached out for Silence. Kelsey grabbed onto Silence’s other arm and held on tightly.
“You can’t have him,” Kelsey screamed. “He doesn’t belong to you.”
“He belongs to whoever has him,” the sailor insisted as he tugged on the boy’s arm. Silence was being pulled in two directions at once.
“What seems to be the problem?” Roland asked wearily from his resting place. The sailor looked around fearfully but didn’t seem to know where Roland’s voice was coming from.
“Is someone talking?” the sailor asked hesitantly. “I hear a voice. Did someone say something?” Kelsey ignored him as he looked around suspiciously.
“This man is trying to take Silence from us,” Kelsey told Roland. “He wants to make him work in the galley.” The sailor was still looking around cautiously to determine the source of the phantom voice.
“What a fool,” Roland remarked quietly as he sat up and took off his sunglasses to take a closer look at the man. The sailor froze, turned his head slowly and locked eyes with Roland for the first time.
“Sweet mother of pearl!” the sailor exclaimed fearfully. He suddenly released his grip on Silence and began running in the opposite direction. When he reached the other side of the ship, he jumped overboard into the raging sea before he could think about what he was doing.
“Oh, my,” Kelsey said softly as she watched. “I didn’t really believe anyone would panic when they saw you.”
“Now perhaps you understand how special you are,” Roland said as Kelsey replaced his sunglasses and he fell back into a reclining position. “Very few people can stand to look into my eyes.”
“Is that man dead?”
“No, he’s not dead,” Roland said lethargically as he rolled over onto his side. “
But he’ll never be able to remove the stain he just made in his pants. They’re completely ruined.” Kelsey walked over to Roland and hugged him.
“Please feel better, Roland,” she begged as she released her hold on him. She looked at his weak form and it made her sad to see him that way.
“I will,” he answered. “But for now, please let me enjoy my illness. It may be the last one I have for a while.”
Kelsey looked over at Megan, who was still swatting at the rough sea and coming back with empty paws. Kelsey preferred the company of death to the healer. Megan still made her feel uncomfortable.
“The sea is so powerful,” Kelsey remarked to Roland. “Not even Megan can overcome it. She’s struggling for food.”
“Being powerful does not mean that you can never be conquered.”
“I just mean that, well, we’re in the middle of the sea, so the water has all the power because it holds us. It surrounds us. We have nowhere to go.”
“No one has all the power - ever. The water only has the power you choose to give it,” Roland answered sleepily. “The same water that can give life, as you saw when you needed it in the desert, also has the power to take it by crushing the air out of you if you drown. It’s a matter of proportion and circumstance. But you always have more control than you think. The wind and the water are strong forces, but you don’t have to let them make decisions for you. There’s always a choice.”
“Why is the sea so hostile?” Kelsey asked as she felt the ship rocking back and forth. “I feel like we’re being punished.”
“The sea is angry because we’re crossing it. As the sister mentioned, no one likes to be crossed.” Roland quickly sat up and vomited over the side of the boat. “Oh, that was a good one. I felt like my internal organs were going to come up that time.”
“Was it painful?” Kelsey asked empathetically.
“Very much so. I haven’t had an illness this good in ages. I shall treasure the experience forever.” Roland’s tongue fell out of his mouth but he made no effort to pull it back into place. Kelsey began to feel uncomfortable with Death looking so undignified. She stood up and walked over to Megan. Even if she didn’t like the healer as much as she liked the company of Death, Kelsey knew that everyone needs some privacy once in a while. She also thought that there must be a way to help Roland.
