The Storm Witch

by Violette Malan

  “Almost a month to cross the Long Ocean,” he said.

  “Usually time enough, if a man and a woman are determined.”

  “My soul—” Parno broke off, then reconsidered. There was one way to check, and Dhulyn would have thought of it long before he did. Her woman’s time had passed, but only just. Her Sight would be at its clearest. “Would you See for me? Would you use the tiles?”

  Parno watched her face closely, nodding to himself when the usual reluctance, the flaring of the nostrils and the twist of the lips that always followed this suggestion didn’t come. She still wasn’t ready to tell him why she was looking secretly at the tiles. Goes on much longer, I’ll have to ask, he thought.

  Dhulyn pushed herself upright and rounded the table, laying her hand on Parno’s shoulder as she passed him. Her small pack was on the lower bunk where she’d pushed it after stowing away the weapons she had cleaned. The ancient, silk-lined olive wood box that held her personal set of vera tiles was in a pocket she’d made along one side. She rounded the table again and sat down opposite Parno, setting the box on the table between them. She searched through the tiles until she’d found Parno’s own tile, the Mercenary of Spears, and gave it to him.

  “Close your hand around it,” she said. “Think of the question you’d like answered.”

  “How does that help?” he asked. “I don’t bear a Mark.”

  “It does no harm,” she said, as she sorted out the Marked tiles, the ones that did not form a part of the ordinary gambler’s vera set. The straight line, representing the Finder; the Healer’s rectangle, the Seer’s circle with a dot in the center, the Mender’s triangle, long and narrow like an Imrioni spearhead. The only unique tile, the Lens, was in its own tiny silk bag, drawstrings made from thin braids of Dhulyn’s own hair. She set aside one each of the Marked tiles, then made sure all the other sets, the coins, cups, swords, and spears, along with the remaining Marks, were facedown. Placing her hands palms down on the tiles she shuffled them, all the time concentrating on Parno’s question.

  DHULYN IS STANDING On THE UPPER AFT DECK, In FRONT OF THE WHEEL. THERE IS VERY LITTLE WIND, AND IT SEEMS AS THOUGH THE SHIP DOES NOT MOVE. BUT THE CURRENT CARRIES IT, AS IT CARRIES THE CRAYX. A MOVEMENT, AND A TAIL LIFTS LAZILY OUT OF THE WATER, ONE FLUKE OF WHICH IS HOOKED THROUGH THE CHILD’S HARNESS. In A MOMENT, DHULYN IS CLOSER TO THE RAIL, AND SHE SEES, BELOW THE CHILD, BELOW THE CRAYX, DEEPER THAN SHE SHOULD BE ABLE TO SEE WERE SHE NOT SEEING, SCHOOLS OF FISH, PLANTS FLOATING JUST AT THE EDGE OF WHERE THE LIGHT PENETRATES THE WATER. COMPARED TO THESE OBJECTS, THE SHIP MOVES SWIFTLY, INDEED.

  THE CRAYX’S TAIL LIFTS THE CHILD HIGHER, OVER THE RAIL OF THE MAIN DECK, AND DEPOSITS HER, LAUGHING, On HER STUBBY LEGS. THE CHILD CANNOT MAINTAIN HER BALANCE, AND LANDS WITH A THUD On HER BACKSIDE. SHE DOES NOT CRY, HOWEVER, BUT TURNS OVER On HER KNEES AND PREPARES TO STAND UP AGAIN. HER HAIR, STILL SHORT, IS THICK, COARSE, AND A DARK GOLDEN BROWN. HER EYES, WHEN SHE TURNS TO SMILE AT DARLARA WHERE SHE STANDS BY THE RAIL, ARE A WARM AMBER.

  DHULYN NODS. SO. DARLARA LIVES, AND THERE WILL BE A CHILD . . .

  TWO WOMEN STAND In A CIRCLE WITH A SHORTER, OLDER MAN. THEY ARE ALL THREE DARK-HAIRED, THOUGH THE MAN’S HAIR IS THINNING, AND ONE WOMAN HAS A PRONOUNCED WIDOW’S PEAK. THEY HOLD HANDS, AND ARE CHANTING, OR SINGING, THOUGH DHULYN CANNOT HEAR THEIR VOICES. THE MAN LIFTS HIS HANDS FREE, AND DHULYN SEES THAT HE HAS SIX FINGERS On HIS LEFT HAND . . .

  THE SLIM WOMAN AGAIN, HER DELICATE CHEEKBONES MORE HARSHLY REVEALED NOW, HER SHORT CAP OF CRISP, SANDY HAIR GRAYING. SHE PEERS INTO THE EYEPIECE OF A LONG CYLINDER ALMOST AS THICK AROUND AS THE WOMAN HERSELF IS. DHULYN CANNOT SEE THE END OF THE CYLINDER; IT PASSES THROUGH THE ROUNDED CEILING OF THE ROOM THE WOMAN STANDS In. NEXT TO HER IS A TABLE, COVERED WITH CHARTS, An UNROLLED PARCHMENT HELD OPEN WITH A MUG OF SOME DARK LIQUID AND A PAIR OF CARTOGRAPHER’S COMPASSES. THE WOMAN MAKES An IMPATIENT SOUND, TURNS TO THE TABLE, SHUFFLES THE PAPERS AROUND WITH HER LONG FINGERS UNTIL SHE FINDS A SCRAP THAT HAS NO WRITING On IT, AND MAKES A NOTE BEFORE TURNING BACK TO THE EYEPIECE. . . .

  NO MORE, DHULYN THINKS, NO MORE. BUT THE VISIONS CONTINUE.

  THE FLOOR TILTS AND BECOMES THE DECK OF A SHIP. A STORM RAGES—

  NO!

  “You’re green as a grass snake, are you going to be sick?”

  “Idiot! Out of the way!”

  Five

  “BUT CAN HEAR YOU better when you play.”

  Parno Lionsmane let the chanter of his pipes fall from his lips. “Which is a fine thing for them, but is doing nothing for me.”

  “Your mind relaxes with the music,” Darlara said.

  Parno rubbed the back of his neck with the hand not holding his pipes. He had an idea. “Tell them to be ready.”

  He set his pipes on the deck in front of him and shut his eyes, taking three deep breaths and letting them out slowly. He let his eyes fall open and fixed them on his chanter, the third sound hole down. Another three breaths. Nothing but the sound hole. A hole was nothing. Absence. No sound and no hole.

  Suddenly his throat closed and his stomach dropped as a wave of fear washed over him, pimpling his skin and setting his heart hammering. He blinked, blew out his breath sharply, and looked up. The fear subsided, but his heart still hammered.

  “There. Felt that.”

  “Anything wrong with making me feel happy?” Parno could hear the annoyance in his voice.

  “Fear’s the easiest to be sure of. Happy feels different for everyone.”

  Parno nodded. That was undoubtedly true. He leaned over to pick up his pipes, and when he glanced up, Darlara was smiling at him.

  “Wouldn’t have known you were afraid, if I hadn’t known what was coming.”

  Parno stood up. “I’ve been afraid before,” he said. “I know fear won’t hurt me.”

  Darlara’s smile changed, and he found himself smiling back.

  Parno was easing the door of the cabin shut, but at a sound from behind him, he relaxed, letting the concentration of the Hunter’s Shora dissipate. Not even he could walk into Dhulyn’s room without awakening her.

  “Out of curiosity,” she asked, her rough silk voice coming from the dark shadow that was the lower bunk. “Where is Captain Malfin sleeping?”

  “When Malfin’s on watch, Darlara isn’t.” Parno sat down on the end of the bench nearest him, the air bag of his pipes letting out a bleat as it pushed against the table’s edge.

  “I heard you in the night, playing to the Crayx.”

  There was light enough coming through the shutters that he knew she could see him nodding. “They can hear me, that’s certain. And when they answer, I can—almost—hear them. Darlara says that if I stayed here, the Pod sense would awaken fully, eventually.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I told her that for Mercenaries there is no ‘eventually.’ ”

  Dhulyn rolled to sit upright, swinging her legs free of her blankets. “There’s that.” She pulled up one leg, resting the heel of her foot on the hard wooden edge of the bunk and wrapping her arms around her knee.

  Parno considered telling her about the fear, then decided against it. She would find a way to laugh at him about it. “They don’t speak, exactly, but I do get glimpses,” he told her instead. “They see the world differently.”

  “Parno, my heart, they live underwater.”

  Dhulyn got to her feet, pulled her sleep tunic off over her head and reached for her linen trousers and multicolored vest, lying over the bench where she had left them.

  He waved her observation away. “But think about what that means. Even in the smallest things.” He frowned, searching for an example. “For us, ‘down’ is only a direction to fall—however carefully we might control the falling. For the Crayx, ‘down’ is another right, or left, north, or south.” He shook his head. “I’m not explaining it well, but better, I think, than it was explained to me.”

  “It’s hard to explain what you take for granted as normal.” Dhulyn frowned, reaching around to her
left to tie her first sword sash. “Do the Nomads share their thoughts with the Crayx?”

  “Just like Racha birds and their Clouds, yes. But there’s more. All adult Nomads can see through the Crayx’s eyes, and the Crayx through theirs. With the Racha, only the bonded Cloud can hear the bird’s thoughts. But while you are with a Crayx, if it shares the thoughts of another, you can share them, too.”

  “And they share your thoughts?”

  “Apparently. Think of it, my soul. To be able to hear another’s thoughts, even indirectly, to be able to converse, mind to mind.”

  “I already know far more than I need to about what you think.”

  Parno laughed and caught the biscuit she threw at him. All the same, he thought, I’d give my best sword to know what you’re thinking, right now.

  “You’d be able to do this, then, eventually?” Her brows drew together.

  “Ah well, I’ll learn what I can now, and hope for more on the trip back. These Crayx have other tasks besides teaching me.”

  There. There it was again. That change in her face, subtler this time, but unmistakable. Ice-gray eyes suddenly dark as she paled, the blood shifting away under her skin. Just now, while they were talking, what he was beginning to think of as the “old” Dhulyn had resurfaced. Animated, curious, already thinking of how to apply this new knowledge of the Crayx to what she knew of the world, of the Shora, of the Brotherhood. But now that guarded, shuttered look had returned, her face a mask, with something hidden underneath.

  Surely she couldn’t believe that he would follow the Crayx, Pod sense or no? Parno pressed his lips together, finding himself annoyed. How many times did he have to prove to her that he was as much a Mercenary Brother as she was? That he wasn’t going anywhere, and never would?

  A good thing we’re Partnered, he thought, half angry, half amused. If any other woman annoyed him this much, he’d have to kill her.

  “Come, you know you’ll tell me eventually,” he finally said. “Whatever the problem is that’s worrying you, you can’t keep it to yourself forever.”

  A flash of consternation passed over Dhulyn’s face, flecked through with surprise, and then his Partner smiled. “Did you not just tell me that for Mercenaries, there is no ‘eventually’?” Almost, almost that was her normal tone, her normal expression.

  “Not good enough. What stops you—we’ve changed direction,” he said, coming to his feet. Mercenary Brothers could not afford to become disoriented in the heat of battle, and their sense of direction was strong and well trained. They had been traveling more or less northeast, or northeast by east with the wind steady behind them since leaving the Letanian Peninsula and the Herculat Straits—the eastern-most point of the continent that was Boravia—more than half a moon before. Now they were heading almost directly north.

  Dhulyn was already at the door to the cabin and Parno followed her out to the main deck where they found the crew assembling in the large open space between the afterdeck and the central cabins. Both captains were standing on the afterdeck, clearly preparing to address the crew.

  By now Dhulyn Wolfshead had become accustomed to the way the Nomads reacted to Parno. The nods and small salutes—some, she saw, even touched their fingertips to their foreheads in the Mercenary manner. But what made her well-Schooled instincts uneasy was the number of people, of both sexes, who touched Parno as he passed them by.

  Luckily, they didn’t also touch her, or she would have had to do something about it. Dhulyn had quickly realized that, due to their shared Pod sense, the Nomads accepted and included Parno in a way that did not include and accept her. She was used to being excluded—even if she hadn’t been a Mercenary Brother, her coloring and height marked her clearly for an Outlander. Even Darlara’s increasing air of possession hadn’t bothered her—she was used to women who were bedding Parno looking on him as their own. What could be more natural for the period of time the passion lasted? But this was something different. The more Parno was accepted, the more she was excluded. And not just by Darlara.

  Something told Dhulyn that it was entirely due to this connection the Nomads had with Parno that space was cleared for them until they reached the front of the group, looking up to where Malfin and Darlara stood together on the aft deck. A light mist was falling, and many of the crew came pulling on rain gear, mostly short capes made from the supple discarded skins of young Crayx. But rainy and cold as it was, all of the crew were present, including children, who stood quietly with their teachers.

  Now that she knew what to look for, Dhulyn could see the telltale differences in the movements and carriage of some in the crowd that showed there was already some kind of communication going on. Those on watch, for example, were clearly not being relieved, nor were they trying to move closer.

  Perhaps it was this feeling of being left out that led Dhulyn, once they were near the front of the group, to touch her forehead to Ana-Paula, who stood to one side of the captains, her hand resting lightly on the big wheel. When not on watch, the chief pilot had revealed that she shared Dhulyn’s interest in the games of chance that could be played with vera tiles.

  “Speak aloud,” Darlara said. “For Mercenaries, and for children.”

  Dhulyn smiled. This would be the first time she’d been put into the same category as children.

  “Helm,” Malfin called. “Give us the heading.”

  “New heading,” Ana-Paula said. “North by northwest.”

  Any ordinary person, perhaps even the crew themselves, would have been ready to wager that no one reacted to the chief pilot’s statement. But any Mercenary Brother would have sensed the sudden shifting of mood as dozens of pairs of lungs breathed in, feet were shuffled, throats cleared, and eyes flashed to meet each other.

  “North by northwest, it is,” Darlara said.

  Now there were actual murmurs among the children.

  “Most of you will have learned by now that there is another Pod to the north of us, but may not know that is Skydancer Pod.”

  Now the murmurs gained in substance, and even adult voices were raised in tones of excitement as crew members spoke to one another. Dhulyn caught Parno’s eye. Casually, very slowly, they moved so as to stand almost back to back.

  “Heard right,” Darlara said, as if she were answering some remark spoken aloud. “Been seven years since we were in the same current with any of the Dancer Pods, and we’ll lose less than a day by turning to share current with them now.”

  “Any who think our mission can’t wait less than a day, speak now, you’ll be heard.” Malfin looked from side to side and up into the rigging, scanning the crowd for any upheld hand.

  “Go ahead, Captains,” someone called from the rear. A laugh rippled through the crowd.

  “Mikel can’t wait,” someone else called out. The laughter broke out in earnest.

  “Any unmarrieds from the stern watch can exchange,” Darlara said, smiling. “And some from the bow watch. You know who you are. As many as three of each gender may go if there are Skydancers willing. Tell me or Malfin before the evening watch begins.”

  “When will we sight the Skydancer?” It was the teacher, Josel, who asked.

  “Should see her at dawn.”

  The assembly broke up, some heading almost immediately belowdecks or into the upper cabins out of the cold and mist, others gathering in twos and threes to discuss the news privately.

  One young man remained leaning against the starboard rail, apparently not as interested as the others. Dhulyn recognized the young man Conford, who had been tricked into challenging Parno that first morning.

  “Do you disagree with the delay?” she said. “Or are you thinking of making a change?”

  “That won’t be me,” he said, lifting his chin to point out several unmarried crew members who were putting their heads together over by the port rail. “Came only five months ago, myself. Won’t exchange again. At least . . . not without leaving children.” He looked back at her and Dhulyn sensed there was more t
o his tale than what he was telling her. “Not everyone can, or will go.”

  “The captains—”

  “Can’t,” Conford said. “Nor any other who’ve children too young. Or who might have a relative less than two generations distant with the other Pod. The Crayx keep track, how close the bloodlines.” He looked away, and then back at her from under his long, black lashes. “Captain Darlara’s hoping to start a whole new line with a Mercenary babe from your Partner.”

  “We wish her luck,” Dhulyn said.

  “And you, Dhulyn Wolfshead? Like to start a line of your own?”

  “I’ve no Pod sense,” Dhulyn reminded him.

  Conford’s face stiffened. “Had forgotten. Meant no offense, Mercenary.”

  “And none taken.”

  “We didn’t see a sign of the southerners that day,” Xerwin said, pulling his travel-stained tunic over his head. His friend Naxot was unusually quiet, but it gave Xerwin a chance to practice what he would say in his report to his father the Tarxin. His officers had been left behind with the Battle Wings, manning the forts on the southeastern frontier—not that they’d contradict him, but not putting his men into embarrassing situations was what made Xerwin such a popular commander. “But the game, Naxot. Fattest deer I’ve ever seen. You should come next time, I tell you—”

  “Do you think your father would be very angry if I petition to withdraw from my betrothal to your sister?”